Phantoms of Ice and Fire
by Paradigm of Writing
Summary: The Night King invades. Cersei betrays. Daenerys and Jon plan. Jaime wishes to be redeemed, Arya seeks peace. Tyrion feels alone, Sansa desires a need. The Long Night has come, Westeros soon to be undone. A dragon in the sky, a burning sword in the light. A king on a ruined throne, a queen buried beneath five inches of ice and snow. A song to be sung by ghosts. (GoT Season 8 story)
1. Chapter 1: Three Horns in the Night

**Hello there! It's Paradigm of Writing here with something that has gotten me beyond excited. After watching the Season 7 ending, I scourged for the past week to read all the fanfictions detailing how people presume the story will end. I read many after finishing Season 6 on what Season 7 would entail, as those predictions are downright enjoyable to read and create, so thus I decided my own tale, all thought up on one YouTube comment detailing a poetic justice and somewhat bittersweet ending that I hadn't ever thought of before.**

 **So here it is! Since the actual book series is called A Song of Ice and Fire, I thought it'd be a nice homage to have the title include Ice and Fire. Thus, to make it ghastly and ominous, I've come up with a title,** ** _Phantoms of Ice and Fire._** **I never realized exactly how hard it is to keep track of every character regardless that they are all in the same place, and so it looks like my learning of lore and the map and all of that is to skyrocket and grow.**

 **There is a total of 48 chapters, and nearly all of the main characters from the TV show has a point of view, because narrowing how many favorites there are to just four in this summary list is quite hard, given my propensity towards the characters I like on the show, which are Sansa, Theon, Yara, Bronn, Jaime, Bran, and Arya. *le gasp* While I do not dislike Jon nor Daenerys, they were never my favorite characters and the seasons haven't been kind to them. But I digress.**

 **Here we are with Chapter #1: Three Horns in the Night, the beginning to Phantoms of Ice and Fire, how I presume the great Game of Thrones Season 8 shall begin. Enjoy.**

* * *

 _ **Tormund Giantsbane**_

Black clouds mix in with the stalwart gray from above. Ravens caw, the winter winds blow, and the Wall stands tall. Torches lined on both sides give the illuminating diamond surface a sheen glow of amber. _The Wall is kissed by fire._ Shouts of men, wilding and crow, fill the air in distorted roars that blur against the gelid breeze. Above one of the Eastwatch lookouts, a burly man, kissed by fire in the literal state of the phrase, keeps his gaze steady on the frozen woods laid outwards before him.

Tormund Giantsbane has seen much in his time beyond the wall. He's seen much in his time behind it, with the Northern lords and their hearths. The ginger has seen the face of evil clawing at him, destined to bring him down, and the thunderous growl of a beast flying above. Fire, the kind of volcanoes, slash the ground and melt the villains where they lay, and Tormund sees a dragon up close.

A snap of a finger, a lock of ash white hair, a blue spear, and the eyes of a king who Tormund Giantsbane fears.

It's been a week since Daenerys Targaryen, a foreigner in all but last name, sailed off. A week since Tormund watches what seems like Westeros's last resort crumble beneath the frozen lake of ice. A week since the wight's howls no longer fill his ears, seven days of silence and a strange, eerie peace. The man with the eye patch - Beric Dondarrion, if Tormund recalls correctly, as he isn't the greatest with names - stays behind and Tormund is partly glad, as there's a flaming sword for warmth, and Eastwatch could use a little bit of warmth.

He's unable to always know what presences stir behind him as Tormund gives watch, but he feels the heat, the surreal feel of warmth under the man's skin. "Beric," Tormund grumbles.

"Tormund," Beric says at length. Not cold, but not with the fire that burns in the Red Priestess' eyes. Tormund's skin grows cold at the thought of the Lady Melisandre, with her witch spells and her pasty skin that stays burnt despite the chills that have taken even the strongest men.

"You should go down and eat," the wildling dismisses any idea of company. He wishes to be alone.

"As should you. You've been up here too long. How many watches have you done?"

"Too many."

"Then even Giantsbane needs his food," Beric says, with a quip of a smile playing on his lips. The warrior has dealt with the likes of the Hound. He has not traded the Hound for Tormund to be met with the same gruffness and a lack of companionship. However, Beric stills his tongue, seeing that Tormund is adamant on keeping his eyes glued to the trees out beyond, where the emerald frosted pines blend together, and the gray and white amass day and night. "We would see them coming, Tormund."

"And that is why I am not moving," the wildling murmurs back. Tormund remembers the slight look of terror on Jon's face - dare he call the bastard boy a friend - as the two wights barrel into him, the body disappearing underneath the ice. He stands away from the Dragon Queen and the Mormont man, as there's a slight feeling of distrust still in his heart, but all because Daenerys insists that Jon Snow, the King in the North, yet lives. Damned Tormund is to know that the boy who seems to never die comes crawling back.

A rider appears on the foreground of the tree line. Beric watches as Tormund leans in against the side of his railing. The warrior tenses, stepping up with the ginger to examine what is being seen. Down below, against the wall of trees, Tormund's eyes never leave the singular rider that appears, until a second meshes out of the flora, then a third... and soon the footmen. His heart lumps in his throat.

The horn wails into the night. A caw filled with desperate noise blasts through the sky. More undead begin to appear, as if out of thin air. Tormund has heard among the Northmen of the idea to pinch yourself awake if you find yourself to be dreaming. He must be dreaming, he must be dreaming, he must be _dreaming, he must be dreaming, he must be-_

A second horn blast follows the second, and now Tormund counts six horses, with evident blue figures on them, where even their sheen can be seen eight hundred feet in the air. _One for a man of the Night's Watch. Two for wildings. Three for-_

A third rings out, and the sky seems to darken underneath the glare of a White Walker threat. Tormund closes his eyes, muttering an obscenity under his breath. Three horn blasts. _White Walkers._ The wildling thinks he may need new clothes when this night is over, if the night ever ends that is. He and Beric stay still, unmoving, as nothing is happening. The forces of the undead stay among the trees, and the Walkers all are frozen statues that do not move, they do not change pace.

His ears pick up a sound, carried among the wind. _Dark wings breed dark words, foul carrion fly fouler messages._ Beric's head snaps to the sound, this time repeating against the shrill blare of the gusts blowing about. Something blurs by, a flash of light in the darkness, a strange warmth, and Tormund's ears hear the discordance before he sees it. His blood runs cold.

Tormund registers the name.

 _Viserion._

A peal of thunder follows the dragon as it roars by. A stream of near blinding fire courses from its mouth, but the sight nearly makes Tormund pause in awe, a stupefied and horrified awe. The fire is a dazzling night blue, almost the color of Tears of Lys, and he picks up on the sound of crackling. Beric is pulling at his arm, the warrior of light is pulling at it quite fast, and then Tormund runs away from his Eastwatch spot behind Beric.

"Run!" Tormund screams, his words being carried by the sky. _Ginger wildlings shout dark words against the sky._ The Night King zooms along the top of the wall, Viserion's screech haunting, a chill going into Tormund's bones. He's been cold, he's grown up in the cold all his life, but this frigid feel is not one done by freezing temperatures, but of a maliciousness that knows no bounds and does not rest. An evil that does not sleep.

Other wildlings begin to follow Tormund as he runs, and then the godawful crunch freezes everyone in their path. Viserion, with the Night King perched up near the dragon's mid back, has stilled the dragon to unleash his rage at one particular section of the Wall. Tormund witnesses with his own eyes as the entire world around him begins to fall. The screams of the dying below fill his ears, blood roars against his skull, and the wildling is dizzy.

A bowman is racing towards them, terror placed on his face, and then everything underneath him drops. The frightened wildling screams, a yell filled to the brim with terror being the last impression the man shall leave on this world, before his body along with many others plummets down to their doom. Tormund and Beric are blown back to their bottoms by a strong gust of wind, Viserion beginning to fly back.

Tormund watches as a good half of the wall that Eastwatch contains crumbles away, a crash, the loudest crash ever perceived by mortal's ears till the ice sloshes into the sea. The wildling, though distanced from the Night King, sees the wisps of fire illuminate his face, where all he sees is something that'll plague his dreams. A cruel smile, but not one full of teeth. Lips closed, but the eyes radiate enough emotion, an emotion full of victory and evil, an evil that cannot be quelled.

The final chunk of the Wall that had been burned collapses into the sea, and Tormund rushes to another look out post, Beric's presence not far behind. What he sees makes Tormund wish he nearly had died all those days ago on that frozen lake, so he does not have to witness the impending doom take their first steps to a world that is unsuspecting... the Night King flying back over his ranks. One of the White Walker lieutenants points their wicked icicle spear forward, unleashes a cry fouler than the dark wings of an undead dragon, and the masses of the dead begin to move forward.

Beric pulls Tormund away from the ledge, facial expression grim and serious.

"What do you see?"

"The dead have moved!" Tormund cries, a sound unbefitting of a man, but in times like these, one is stupid to not feel a morsel of fear.

The undead begin to make their way, slowly, but not slow enough towards the gap created by the Night King. Beric grabs Tormund along the Wall, most of the Wildlings and new men of the Watch still shell shocked by the travesty they've witnessed. He leans in, his face so close to the wildling that the eye patch could rub against his beard.

"Ride for Winterfell. I do not know if Jon Snow will be there with the Dragon Queen yet, but someone must warn them. You on horseback will get there faster than any raven. Our access to that is limited. There are other ways down."

"And what about you?" Tormund asks, feet still firmly planted against the ground.

"Castle Black must be warned. All of the other castles must be warned," Beric intones darkly. "A routed diverted attack, perhaps. Enough men of the Night's Watch and North hit the Walker forces from behind... a easily needed distraction. Ride as fast as you can, and do not stop. We have weeks, we may have days... but the North must be warned. All of it."

"Don't fail," Tormund says.

"Don't die."

Tormund nods, and the forces atop the Wall begin to run.

The wilding kissed by fire looks up at the night sky, and if he strains hard enough, Viserion's cry, the real dragon and not whatever is stuck inside that monster's mind, can be heard warped with the cries of the North winds.

And far from it, a tide of an ever growing darkness that steps forward, lacing slowly onto a frozen wasteland, now touching solid dirt. A Night King dropping off of his undead mount, another surge of blue fire lacing the clouds in the sky. The White Walker steps forward, the army of the dead silent as usual behind him.

The Night King lowers himself to the ground, a single blade of grass standing tall in the blowing winds and freezing cold. He cranes his head at it, almost smirking in absolute amusement. He lowers his hand towards the ground, pressing firm fingers up against the dirt, just like he did all the way back by the Three Eyed Raven cave, and the cracks rush forth.

It is time to invade.

* * *

 **And there we are ladies and gents! That was Chapter #1: Three Horns in the Night. I decided to start the story off with the collapse of the Wall to make it easier to lead into everything else that'll follow. I jump around a lot with these first ten to fifteen chapters or so, but everything comes together in the end.**

 **I am beyond excited for Season 8, no matter whether if comes late next year, or early the year after that as long as we eventually get it, right? While I do not expect this story to take up until that long to write, it'll definitely be a slow journey to completion, if I may so myself. The Night King is going to definitely pull no punches, and our protagonists have a lot to scramble around if they wish to survive. I have a toll on how many characters I will be killing, and there may be some surprises among those in the list.**

 **So, do you have any predictions for what may be the next step in this possible Season 8 fanfic? Death predictions? Who will sit on the Iron Throne, mayhaps be the greatest one. Thank you all so much for tuning in. A review would be lovely, or even a follow or favorite as there will be much more to come.**

 **Chapter 2 will be sometime next week given how busy my writing and school schedule is, so be patient with me is all that I ask. Instead of saying the point of views directly stated in the Author Notes, or what my chapter titles are like I usually do, it'll be a hint.**

 _ **Next Chapter P.O.V: A Second Son.**_

 **I hope you all have an amazing day! Love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	2. Chapter 2: Harpy King

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Phantoms of Ice and Fire. Last chapter was the opening, starting exactly where Season 7 ended with Tormund and Beric being on top of the Wall at Eastwatch, then the Night King's army emerging, Viserion, blue fire, and** ** _crash! crash!_** **did the Wall fall! I apologize for the long wait for the next chapter, as with Hurricane Irma that had blown through Florida, it left me out of commission for eleven days, and then I had to play a mean game of catch up with school, as it is my senior year and that is something that never lets up... especially with all of my AP classes to boot. However, I'm getting back into the swing of things and will have chapters up for this once a week to start with, and hopefully two times or so to get a good stream going, as we're heading into the upper forties with planned chapters that eventually start to get a lot longer... so my work is cut out for me. If anyone guessed the new P.O.V,** ** _A Second Son,_** **it is Daario Naharis, ladies and gents, left behind to rule over Meereen with the red priestess Kinvarra. This is a huge important chapter for two things that'll you see later. Thank you all for so patiently waiting, and let's get this show on the road.**

 **Please enjoy Chapter #2: Harpy King.**

* * *

 ** _Daario Naharis_**

Bright patches of moonlight come in through the open windows of the Small Council chamber, on the highest floor, at the tallest vantage point in Meereen. Standing out on the terrace is a Second Son. He's starting to forget a troubled past, a past full of fighting and bloodshed that will never wash away, but at the very least have the memories subdued. There's a face he'll never forget, even if he never sees it again until he's gray and old and dying alone in a tarped room. The man snorts. _If_ he lives to the ripe old age of watching everyone else around him die, he'll fall on his own sword before the cough catches up with him.

A face, pale as a new baby boy, with silver hair that accentuates daring eyes. Flames roar in her eyes, and Daario has a lingering taste of sweet wine and charcoal on his lips. Hers have never left his, even if her physical presence is no longer around. Sometimes he still hears Drogon's roar in the sky, sometimes he feels the warmth that comes from her - perhaps not like a red priestess, but a motherly feel, a desire to help the most misfortunate - which stays in a bubble around one of the corridors. Her stare as he undresses, her body lithe and scarred but never burnt, and a name as sweet as a winter rose.

 _Mother of Dragons, Daenerys Stormborn of the House Targaryen, the Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea, the Unburnt, the Breaker of Chains..._ titles and more titles. Daario smirks to himself silently. Daenerys Targaryen, a girl destined for greatness on the other side of the world, and he is to no longer have any part in it. Part of him still has a bitter seed down deep, now buried underneath making sure the grand city of Meereen does not crumble without the Mother of Dragons around. Sure, Tyrion Lannister and Varys the Spider kept the city from ruin, but Daario is a humble man in one aspect; he's no king, he's no ruler.

Like a child, he watches the last of her fleet vanish into the vast blue beyond, stunning with the black sails and the sigil of a ferocious dragon plastered on the center. Her three children, soaring around and flying through the sky as the clouds break between them. As soon as she slips into his grasp, she's gone, and Daario hardly has enough memories to keep them all in one place.

One thing will stay forever in his mind.

The sex. _Oh,_ the sex. _I cannot have a paramour or lover in Westeros. I need to be available for marriage... a throne is won on an alliance, secured and blah, blah, blah._

Daario interrupts her with a coarse, "Fuck!" that perhaps would get him reprimanded in an another case, but there is something true behind the strength in his voice, and how he feels his eyes plead. He doesn't want to lose her. He feels he will lose her again, as he once did when she took to the sky and never came back, until everything dissolved into chaos and golden masks ruled instead of a fearsome beast. Over the course of his life, Daario Naharis has gained and lost many things. He didn't come into the service of Daenerys, to fall in love with Daenerys, and to then lose it all, like much of what he's already experience.

He's powerless to stop a woman from desiring their true goal. It is something he should've learned a long time ago.

Inside the Small Council chamber, a fire is growing in one of the hearths over in the corner. Daario has heard stories and tales of blue eyed beasts, with skin as dark as the starry night sky that bring the cold. Meereen is still sweltering in a summer heat, Essos is still scorching, and Westeros is absolutely freezing. Another smirk. Daario feels jealousy and contempt for not being able to go over and help achieve his queen's dreams, but warmth and sunshine... it rises above personal matters at times.

Another presence is added into the room, and Daario feels it by the subtlety and shift of weight on the carpeted floors. He rights himself from the terrace, overlooking the ancient city in its gilded cobblestone and quarry, with the sounds of the people, and the silence of a world old in age. Extra heat pours into the room, and he turns around. Crimson robes that accentuate a moonlit face is the first thing he sees, but the facial expression that his visitor wears changes everything.

"Daario," the red priestess Kinvarra, who's dressed lightly and burns brightly, nods.

"Priestess," he acknowledges, walking back into the room. He's hit in the face with a blast of surreal heat, as if Drogon had opened his mouth and scorched the dirt. In the center of the room is the council table, on it being a few raven scrolls that were sent from Varys over on Dragonstone detailing Daenerys's troubles and 'adventures' in the West. Only five are scattered on the table, and in Kinvarra's hands, a sixth.

After Daenerys left, and it took many days for this idea to come about, Daario, Kinvarra, and other leaders of Meereen who had been put in place alongside them to govern the city, created a typical aviary for raven messages to come in out of the city, primarily to inform Daenerys of the current state of Meereen. Messages going out of the grand city of Slaver's Bay had been quite dull, as Daario and Kinvarra were not running into too much trouble, at least nothing on the scale Daenerys had been forced to endure.

Kinvarra holds out the sixth raven scroll in her hand, her usual composure slightly waning as her hand partially trembles. "Arrived not so long ago," she says, and he takes the scroll in his hands.

Daario peers down at it, and what he reads almost brings him to his knees.

 _Much has happened as of late. The King of the North, Jon Snow, has gone beyond the Wall to provide me and Ceresi Lannister evidence that the White Walkers are real. I was stalwart in not wanting this mission to happen, but thus I granted him my permission and off he went. Later, though how much time I cannot tell, another raven is sent back... and Jon Snow with his companions are trapped. I take Drogon, I take Viserion, and I take Rhaegal... beyond the Wall I went. Jon Snow is right. There's an army of undead, wights as Jon Snow calls them. A leader called the Night King. Viserion has died... and Jon Snow has gotten his prize; a wight to show Ceresi Lannister, and perhaps bring this Iron Throne business to an end._

 _~ Daenerys Targaryen_

The Second Son throws the raven scroll on the table, joining the others that seemed to not have brought good fortune. The first, which Kinvarra eagerly rushed in, detailed how Daenarys arrived on Dragonstone. The second, a lamentation; the Greyjoy forces she had received were taken by the wind. A third, detailing the capture of Casterly Rock and the loss of Highgarden. A fourth, of this illustrious Jon Snow that Daario has half the wits to throw that raven scroll in the fire if his anger have him. The fifth, and perhaps the happiest yet, was the battle Daenerys had against the Lannister forces that had wiped out Highgarden; finally a victory.

And now a sixth.

Detailing skeleton ghosts who walk on ice, are made of ice, and are colder than ice itself. A dragon, plummeting out of the sky, an explosion, a fireball... staying behind as it drops down, _down, down_ and dies.

Daario places his hands on the table, looking up at the red priestess who seems to be just as lost as he is. "Written by her own hand..."

Kinvarra walks around the other side of the room, a hand perched on the back of one of the chairs. "Had this Jon Snow never left... Viserion wouldn't be-"

"How do you kill a dragon?" the disbelief is rampant in Daario's voice. He's seen how gigantic Daenerys's children had grown to before they left to Westeros, and he imagines they had grown stronger and larger still. He's heard the story of how they were born, stone made into flesh and magic transformed into reality. Beautiful beasts they were indeed, and he's seen one up close, he's seen Drogon's power up close... and one of hers is dead, to this Night King that cannot sound like anything humanly.

"They've been killed before..." Kinvarra observes, going to sit by the fire. Silence pervades over them, the room quiet against the harsh clutter and crackle of the logs in the hearth, the flames roaring and burning brighter as the red priestess attends to it. Daario wants to go back out on the terrace and hit something, anything... to quell a rage that boils underneath.

A beautiful creature of Westeros doesn't deserve to die for someone he's never met.

He's unsure of what to do. Tiredness is beginning to settle on his eyelids; he's been up since the early hours of the dawn setting to listen to people's complaints and go through training boughs with the other Second Sons, gaining new recruits daily from the old slaves that had been liberated from their arrival. Daario wants to collapse back onto his bed, but he doesn't leave the room, as he can tell there is something Kinvarra wishes to say, as if he can feel the change of the mood in the room.

"There's more... isn't there?" he asks. Daario encloses one hand into a fist.

Kinvarra turns away from the fire to look at the Second Son, and he's unsettled by the harsh glow in her eyes. "The sellsword company, the Golden Company, was spotted sailing into Volantis. All of their ranks accounted for."

Daario rubs his chin. "What would a sellsword company be doing in Volantis of all cities?"

The flames at the hearth roar to life, crackling as embers spill out into the empty air of the council room. Kinvarra turns back around, answering Daario's question. "There is no definite answer, but it is my belief that a Westeros lord wishes to use them. For what purpose? I cannot tell."

"You wouldn't be able to see the answer in the flames?"

Kinvarra smiles sweetly at Daario. "I am no psychic of the future, Captain Naharis. The Lord of Light will occasionally show me something he believes I should see, and it is up to me to decide what must be done with the information brought before me."

Daario nods, deciding he's been still in the council chamber for too long. Tomorrow is a long day of training new recruits in simple parrying techniques, and if any previous interactions with the new ones on the chopping block have been an indicator, Daario will need a night's rest that can supply into his dwindling lack of patience.

He pauses at the exit doorway from the council chamber. "Good night, priestess," he says, and turns to go left down the corridor towards his quarters.

However, as Daario's vision passes the corner of a room, he stops. Kinvarra's body is leaning towards the fire, eager and almost as if she were to fall in. One of her pale hands is raised up, her right hand, as if she's telling Daario to stop and wait. He crosses the threshold once more, back into the room, and more embers spark into the sky, and the color of the flames darken to an almost ripe ruby red blood color.

"What is it?" he questions aloud, hesitant to step any further.

Kinvarra shakes her head in a dulled anger. "I... I feel as if I see something... my lord wants to give me a sign, but I cannot see much. Only an obscurity..."

Daario notices that the curtains in the room are fluttering away from their hinges, as if there's a wind blowing through, but he himself feels nothing on his exposed arms. Only the warmth of the fire, that causes Kinvarra to be surrounded by a halo of sunburst light, till it starts to get brighter and brighter. The red priestess clenches the sides of the hearth, her fingers digging into the stone crevices.

He has to turn away, as the flames begin to brighten to an almost obscene sheen, a glow that rivals that of the sun if it were to be stared at. Kinvarra leans further in, and then a great roar comes from the hearth. The red priestess screams, ripping herself forcefully from the fire. Atop the hearth is a pitcher full of water. She seizes it and douses the flames with as much of a hurried pace as she can.

Kinvarra's scream is what breaks Daario to look back, and the light is gone, the flames kindled and smoke billowing out of the hearth. Her breathing is ragged, heard over the sizzling of the water inside the metal grate. The logs are all charred black, and bits of charcoal spill out onto the council room floor.

Daario grabs Kinvarra's arm, turning the priestess around so he can look at her. The generally confident and benevolent fire that burns in her eyes is dimmed, eyes wide and full of terror. Her skin is cold and clammy, something that he has never seen before, nor is he able to understand now. Kinvarra's face is paler than usual, where he can see the veins and capillaries underneath her porcelain skin. He holds her gently, the priestess physically _shaking._

"Are you alright?"

She shakes her head slowly, catching her breath, having wasted it all in the scream. "I- I'm fine," Kinvarra nods weakly.

"What did you see?" Daario asks, looking back at the hearth with a glare, not trusting it. He has seen the red priestess witness a vision in the flames before, when she had detailed Daenerys's victory against the Lannister forces. All she had seen was a pillar of flame devour soldiers in red armor, and the whistling sound of a spear, before the fire had died. But nothing, nothing like this. Not where imaginary winds were to blow, when the fire was to burn like a supernova, and when Kinvarra would unleash a blood curdling scream.

Kinvarra looks at the Second Son straight in the eyes.

"Blue. Everywhere..." she details, her voice a hushed whisper. "Everything seemed to be one blur that I couldn't quite make out. Then the blue orbs transformed into eyes, hundreds, thousands... maybe more if so. I heard a laugh, cold and chilling. Then it all vanished, and there was one image standing left after all else had disappeared." Her voice breaks, and she looks down at the floor.

"What, Kinvarra?" Daario urges her, shaking the red priestess. She shakes her head again, biting her lip.

"The Dragon Queen."

"You saw Daenerys. What about her?"

Kinvarra's words rock Daario to the core.

"She was dead."

* * *

 **And there we are ladies and gentlemen! That was Chapter #2: Harpy King. I originally hadn't planned for a chapter to include anything outside of Westeros besides Euron and the Golden Company, but then I realized that even though the show itself has abandoned the Essos plotline as it is no longer relevant - Daenerys isn't there, no need to be there - that the Second Son and red priestess left behind can add something into the story, which is exactly what has just happened.**

 **There were a few things I took into consideration, as I've been reading many other stories of possible Season 8 plotlines, and I don't recall there being Melisandre looking into the flames and seeing visions that could help in the Long Night, as it is now _here_ in Westeros, so those visions are more important than ever. So far, in the course of the show, these flames haven't lied... and they haven't lied to the Hound either, who we all know isn't a devout follower of any Lord of Light shenanigans. So... now I raise a question. Since Melisandre has misinterpreted her visions, what happens in the very core of them is true.**

 **Is this, however, with Kinvarra not the case? A dead Daenerys Targaryen would throw quite a wench in things, I'd say. All for tension, I suppose. I haven't planned to go back to Meereen for any purpose as there's nothing Daario and Kinvarra could quite literally do as Daario and the rest of the Second Sons were told to stay in Meereen and that is what they shall do. Unless there's a massive outcry for a return, there won't be, but I did feel there needed to be a chapter in there. From this point forward, everything else that happens is entirely central to Westeros and the plot there.**

 **Chapter 3 will be out next week, just have to finish tweaking some things, and adding onto issues I saw in my original drafts. Is there any predictions you have going forward, or detailing with vision Kinvarra saw in the fire?**

 _ **Next Chapter P.O.V: A Left Handed Man**_

 **Thank you all so much for reading this chapter, and I hope you'd take the consideration to review and let me know what you've been thinking. Your help would be invaluable! I hope you all have an amazing day! Love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	3. Chapter 3: Gold in the Snow

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Phantoms of Ice and Fire, Chapter #3: Gold in the Snow. We're back to Westeros for the rest of this fanfic, and I'm super excited to start getting into the meat and grit of the possible Season 8 story. Last time, we were over in Meereen with Daario Naharis and the red priestess Kinvarra, to get to see how the red priestess saw a vision in the fire of a White Walker invasion, and in the midst of it all, Daenerys lying dead in the snow. Tragic things are afoot, and for Arc 1: Carrion Carry Foul Words, foul words have begun to spread. By the chapter P.O.V and now the title of said chapter, our main point of view for this chapter is Jaime! Jaime fookin Lannister, and boy don't I love him. I know he's got a horrible world of controversy surrounding him, but I just want him to be redeemed in Westeros and not having someone constantly point the finger. Of course, with Jaime, that means Bronn, and they're two of my favorites; ensuing hilarity shall ensue. Thank you all so far for the views, as goodness it is climbing the ranks. I'd love some more reviews I was to be frank, as I'd like to know what people are thinking about the piece, but we'll go one step at a time. Enjoy Chapter #3: Gold in the Snow.**

* * *

 _ **Jaime Lannister**_

As expected, coming from a background of gold, and gold lines, and confidence exuding in gold shrouds, it is understandable to sympathize with the fact Jaime Lannister is unable to comprehend why the gloominess of gray skies and gray clouds and gray hearts were appealing to the people of the North. When traveling to Winterfell on King Robert's journey to ask Ned Stark to be Hand of the King - _by the Seven,_ Jaime thinks pointedly to himself, _I'm returning to where all the madness started. I'm a dead man. -_ he is unsure whether or not the sky had been as bleak back then as it is now.

His horse trots slowly up a hill, having paced fast and long throughout the morning for a lulled, quiet evening once the sun started to settle beneath the sky. It's been three and a half weeks since he left King's Landing, taking to the road and forever turning the city he has known for more than half his life behind his back, never once looking back. His golden hand constantly clumps against his chest as he rides, acting as a reminder of the sewage, of the electric blonde hair glaring back at him, a knife, a droplet of blood, poisoned wine, and green. Green everywhere, lacings of flame eating up the walls, the screams of the dying spilling out into the sky.

He shudders, banishing the thought behind.

Jaime stops his horse on the climax of the hill, looking behind him wistfully. Down south, there's death and commiseration for the saps in the Crownlands, the Reach, the Stormlands, Dorne... more than half of Westeros has no idea what is coming through the Long Night. To the north, there's death marching around and creating more of it, and a lack of empathy once the golden lion is to show his pride in the field of ice and snow.

Galloping up the hill behind him is his only traveling companion. Jaime has never been so attached - mentally, and in a way, physically - to a single other person besides his sister and Tyrion. He refuses to even think of her name, the golden queen with wildfire and a zombie that nearly chops his head off, but he walks away unscathed and the snow that falls down on his face is replacing the tears he wishes would come forth at times.

Ser Bronn of the Blackwater - _gods, aren't titles pretentious -_ matches up to speed with him at the top of the hill. Bronn's dark hair is darker under the shadow and glare of the northern skies, his beard poking out some in rough patches of stubble around his chin. Weathered lines sink in on an already darkening face, and through it all Bronn's steely gaze remains. Jaime is unsure whether or not to call him a sellsword any more, as he's been more family than a distant companion the way things have been going.

"Why'd you stop?" Bronn asks.

"I was waiting for you."

"No you weren't. You got stuck in your head, as you've been doing for the past four days whenever you get ahead of yourself."

Jaime locks his jaw, looking away from the knight. He rides up the hill some more, unable to bring his face to look at Bronn in the eye. He's right, however. _Of course he's right. Everything gets under your skin nowadays, the great, giant Jaime Lannister a bawling mess on the ground._ The golden boy does not know what warpath plan he's on when he rides from the capital, longing to get away from the rolling hills and the smell of lurid smoke that fills the sky. He's forgotten entirely about Bronn, leaving him in the den of vipers, with a woman who has threatened to murder him and already distrusts him as far as she could throw the knight.

Which isn't exactly very far.

He stops his horse now at the very tip of the hill, Bronn once more following his lead. Only a few miles away from King's Landing, as Jaime stops himself at a river to get a drink, the snow falling and kissing the dirt laden ground, his companion that he left behind surprises him half to death in the middle of near nowhere in the pitch black darkness. The backhand he receives across from the face - Bronn can give a mean slap, Jaime understands how Black Walder Frey must've felt when he hit him at Riverrun - sprawls him to the dirt, and the trusting knight that Bronn is dusts his hands off, saying that it is worth it to see the golden Lannister lion sprawled out in the dust like the cocky jerk he is.

Jaime isn't - he's been unsure lately, more now than ever - able to determine if Bronn is pissing off the usual insults and jabs, or an actual bitterness that is sincerely full of vitriol and venom. He's content on not being the only one to face the Northerners wrath on not having an army with him to contest the Night King's forces of wights, as so far in the three week's journey, Jaime has not come across any meager pile of Lannister forces, as if Cersei - _damn her,_ he thought angrily, _that bitch has entered my thoughts -_ had called the banners to pull them all away, vanished, aloof and out of thin air as if they had never made a mark in the first place.

He's got no forces, one hand, a tarnished reputation everywhere, and he's somehow expecting mercy.

The day is getting better and better the more he thinks about it.

Jaime has stared death down in the face before, in the face of the snarling bear that claws at Brienne - Jaime flinches when thinking of the maid from the Isle of Tarth, her sunbeam hair, her steely gaze, her wickedness with a sword, her honor - when they were imprisoned at Harrenhall... he's never seen an animal filled with such anger and rage that comes to a boiling point.

He'll never be able to get the face of the wight he saw in the Dragon Pit out of his face. Bronn asks what he had seen in the pit, having been away with Podrick for the Westeros fantasy business wasn't exactly in his calling, and the look of fear that pervades Jaime's eyes is a look that rivets Bronn's core. Jaime recounts the hanging of the skin that clings to the bare skull, eye sockets with nothing there that are somehow filled to the brim with pure malice, far more than any glare Cersei has given anyone, including Tyrion or Margarey. The hissing and snarls it made, to think it once had been a breathing, living person... it is a fact he cannot steer away from no matter where he tries having his heart lead it. He put into a gloomier perspective, as if it was the last thing he ever needed, on how there is a creature that makes these... these beasts with the simple touch of his hands and the raise of his clawed, gelid blue fingers. Thousands of them, _hundreds of thousands of them,_ as the bastard King in the North, Jon Snow, says, when prompted. If one causes such terror in Jaime's eyes, he hopes to be able to face a band of a thousand.

What stuns him beyond belief, as there has never been much in his life to do so - Aerys comes to mind... _burn them all, burn them all, burn them all! -_ is his sister's reaction. He's tried biting his tongue to stem the thought process from continuing any longer as she's supposed to be dirt under his feet, but Jaime cannot cut the ties so rapidly, in such a manner that'll forever haunt his days. Cersei is an unwavering block of stoic emotion, flinching and recoiling only when the wight lunges for _her,_ and her only with grasped claws and outstretched hands forged in the fires of old Valyria. Perhaps she is being selfish, he muses over a campfire one evening, or she feared for the life of her baby, their unborn son who'll be born with the same madness or troubles as the other children he's had. _Joffrey, Myrcella, Tommen..._

There's a darkness inside his heart, a forever growing surge of hatred for what he's done, for what he will be, and for who he is currently, right now. Will he be called a coward as well, once his infamous name is written down in the books in the years to come? If there are years to come at that...

He breaks off from thinking about it any further, looking out at the vastness before him. More darkness, more gray skies, a more unsettling quiet than before that quietly lulls and rests over the ground. Bronn matches his spot on the hill, stirring the reins in his hand, balancing on his saddle.

"Do you recognize the place?"

"It's Moat Cailin," Jaime answers, and he regrets ever giving a truthful answer. Up there, through the moat, through the thicket and bramble and the howling winter winds is a blackness, a darkness that lurks beneath him and his thoughts. A series of images race by in his mind - a broken tower, a rustle of a tree branch, Cersei's dress spilling around his legs, her moans, Cersei herself, a golden lock of hair, a blue eyed and black haired boy, a push, a shove, a scream, a haughty laugh, a raven, a three eyed raven that caws back at him with eyes full of blood - but they're in as quick as they come. "When Robert Baratheon's envoy went North, it is how we did it going to Winterfell, and how we returned to King's Landing. It's the only way in and the only way out of the North. Once you're inside, you're trapped."

"Looks hideous."

"Most of the North is quite hideous," a silence passes between the two swordsmen. Jaime looks away, unable to continue staring outwards at the vastness of the North, and he's doubting himself more and more nowadays, the golden boy who can no longer smile and boast such a stunning bravado. He takes notice of the blades of grass on the hill that blow in the gelid breeze, or how the blanket of blizzard white settles on the ground. More snowflakes fall from the sky to land on his face, melting, and he's crying all over again, silently weeping to himself. "This is where it all began," he says cryptically.

"What all began?" Bronn asks, looking over at the knight.

"The War of the Five Kings."

"Here at Moat Cailin?"

"In Winterfell," Jaime answers once more, bile threatening to appear. "Had we not come North, had Robert not wanted stupid, honorable Ned Stark to be Hand of the King, hadn't Cersei convinced me to climb that stupid tower!" he shouts suddenly at the sky, taking a deep breath, sultry cold winds filling his lungs. "I caused this entire mess, and only made it worse. I- I don't want to be here."

"You made a promise," Bronn reminds him, and Jaime is reminded of Brienne in this singular moment.

"I did. Unfortunately, my honor is shot. Will this help me rebuild it?"

"Aye, you made a promise. Aye, I'll help you keep it."

"Tyrion's own words... the North never forgets. A proud, stubborn, honorable group of people who are the worst type to be around," Jaime spits out. "I pushed a prince of theirs from a window. I screwed my sister in their crown jewel. I killed a king, I had three children of incest... and I'm returning to my early grave..." He lets out a raucous laugh. "If the Long Night came right now, I'd be more than happy!"

Bronn eyes Jaime warily. "You'd do some good to get some rest. Approach, and we should get granted entry."

"Anything to get us out of this cold."

The two knights spurred their horses once more, beginning to gallop down the hill with the wind whipping in their faces, flurries of snow blasts and breezes colliding with pale, Southern skin, and it stings, it burns, and Jaime sees green fire lacerating the soil, killing the insects, burning his flesh, and he laughs. His laugh is to himself, is laugh is a broken cry of pain, his laugh is one filled with a myriad of emotion that he cannot understand.

As they begin to approach, Jaime sees several riders emerge from the gates of Moat Cailin, nothing more than a probable scouting party to learn who the sudden arrivals are. Bronn holds a hand up so the they can stop, Jaime pulling back on his reins so hard he nearly falls off his horse and stumbles down the hill. It'd be even more of a stain to fall off his horse, in the North, during a winter, and be a Lannister.

 _Kingslayer. Man without honor. Father of bastardized children. The man who sleeps with his sister. The man who no longer seems to be able to ride a horse._

As the trio of riders approach, Jaime notices how they're covered in the garb of a house he's unable to exactly place note of. His father, Tywin Lannister, the great roaring lion who made everyone heel and kneel, is surely disappointed from his seventh hell that he's rotting away in as Jaime is biting at his lip to place the house that is greeting him. The three riders are surefire northerners, with the dark hair and pale, _pale_ faces that are shrouded in copse light, blue eyes staring at nothing. He notes the glare, as his Lannister gold armor and Valyrian steel sword is giving away quite the giveaway to he is.

The middle rider is a girl, which Jaime finds quite surprising. She seems to be in her teenage years, with curly dark hair as black as the night with no stars in the sky. Her face is fair, her cheeks weathered and pink, circles bearing sleepless nights and exorbitant amounts of pressure.

"Lannister armor..." she says testily, eyeing the two men. "Who are you? Where are you from?"

Bronn takes up the honors of introducing the merry duo, as Jaime is certain if he even opens his mouth, that he'll have the girl's spear pushed through the front of his mouth and out the back of his head. He shudders, reminded of Oberyn and the manticore venom before the Dornishman's head is splattered flat on the ground, blood pooling everywhere, Tyrion's head bowed, and a judgmental sentence passed on that'll doom House Lannister until the end of time.

"I'm Ser Bronn of the Blackwater," Bronn introduces himself, throwing his arms out with a slight nod, though a mischievous twinkle is in his eyes. "And this is-"

Jaime bites back on his word - if he's done it before, surely there is no problem with doing it now - and decides to speak, as his hasty decisions seem to never have harmed him before. "I'm Jaime Lannister. We're sent by the Queen, Cersei Lannister, to march onto Winterfell to help aid in the battle against the army of the dead. The King in the North, Jon Snow, and the Mother of Dragons, Daenerys Targaryen set out permission..."

The aura of the meeting changes drastically, suddenly, and it threatens to spill over on the brink of destruction. Jaime sees out of the corner of his left eye that Bronn's grip on his sword tightens, and the girl has clenched her teeth, her own weapon perhaps being prepped to plunge into either one of their throats. The other two riders with her stir uneasily, and Jaime figures that his word has no honor, it has no merit, and there will be nothing to help defend him should he be seized right now. No one will defend him, Bronn will be executed, and Jaime's shot at being redeemed is to fall flat before it even begins.

The girl with the spear hisses to herself. "Damn it all..."

"Are we granted safe passage..." Bronn tests the waters, and he wants to use her name, but he does not know it.

She looks at Jaime when giving her answer to Bronn, but the blonde is unsure what that means and where any of this is headed.

"Ser Bronn of the Blackwater, I am Meera Reed of House Reed from Greywater Watch, and safe passage is something I cannot grant," her eyes bore into Jaime's, and a shiver slides down his spine. Someone so steely for someone so young... Cersei could've become this, she could've become a great woman and a fearsome warrior of wits and brawn, but the pettiness and royalty gets to her head and speaks false lies. "As for you, Jaime Lannister, I'm afraid you have made a grave error coming here."

Jaime closes his eyes, almost expelling a breath of fresh air. He'll die, he'll never be redeemed, and everything will return to the way it has always meant to be.

He always thought that his golden armor, covered in blood, would look delightful in the snow.

* * *

 **And there we are ladies and gentlemen! That was Chapter #3: Gold in the Snow, of Phantoms of Ice and Fire. Jaime has always been one of my favorite characters since Season 3 after learning why he had killed the Mad King for the wildfire stint, and he's slowly been reaching up through the ranks as the story has progressed. I realize that my interpretation of his cocky character that he used to be may be on the brink of Jon Snow-esque brooding, but in my head he has gone through a lot, seen a lot, and now that it is just him and Bronn heading to a place that Jaime will be threatened to be killed at every turn... he's got a lot in his head to think and mull over.**

 **I loved writing this chapter out of the three so far, and it seems like Jaime and Bronn's future will be decided later. Meera is here! I really cherish Meera Reed as a character, and since it seems that there is a huge general consensus on Bran being apparently abysmal - I find his storyline quite interesting on the contrary - that she's a great unsung hero. Why would she be in Moat Cailin rather than Greywater Watch? Her role is to come, and it shall be a fun one, as I think D &D will pass her aside rather than not and I hope that isn't the case as she wouldn't have gone through all that she did for naught, personally.**

 **Please let me know what you thought of this chapter! I'd love to hear your thoughts on what Jaime is currently thinking about, and where the story will take a lead next. Chapter 4 will probably be out sometime in the next two weeks as I'm rather busy for the next couple because of school work like essays, group projects, coding, and other commitments that boggle me down.**

 _ **Next Chapter P.O.V's: A Man Who May Never Die + The Salt Queen**_

 **I hope you all have an amazing day! I love you all so much! Have a good day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	4. Chapter 4: Scarred Pikes

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Phantoms of Ice and Fire, Chapter #4: Scarred Pikes. Staying in Westeros for the rest of the story, this shall be one fun wild ride. Last chapter Jaime and Bronn reached Moat Cailin in getting into the North, but Meera Reed stopped them and it looks like complications will be coming into full effect, soon. The main point of views for this chapter are the Greyjoy siblings, Theon and Yara! I have been in love with Theon for a long time and I really hope he gets his excellent,** ** _true_** **redeeming arc in the show - and thus, in this story as well - to where he hopefully does not die... as my heart would break. Enjoy Chapter #4: Scarred Pikes.**

* * *

 _ **Theon Greyjoy**_

The sky is blue, but Theon Greyjoy's heart is dark. Not a darkness that defines evil or malevolence, but one of sadness and melancholy. He looks over the choppy waters, the boat the rest of his, or _Yara's_ rather, crewmates are on rocking slightly with every bob and nuance of the waves. Theon's never seen such black waves, as if the entire sea if having crimson floods poured into it from someplace else, the water churning and discoloring from a cheerful sapphire to a sour and distasteful copper. He rests his shoulders on one of the upper railings, looking over the rest of the deck, sighing as he consumes the sun's rays from above.

Theon feels it in his bones, the strength of his sister slowly sapping away. Slowly, but surely, but she's alive and that is what he's dead set on. Yara Greyjoy will not be abandoned by him ever again, not after the battle on the way to King's Landing. _But, Lord Ramsay said-_

He jerks his head away in pain, a grimace forming on his face. The shear of a knife cuts away flesh, separating body parts from body parts, there's red on his hands, red on the floor, but it isn't his blood. He screams to everyone that it isn't his blood, that he's strong and will be strong for his sister and that there's nowhere Euron Greyjoy can hide to save him from Theon's wrath.

 _What is dead may never die._

Theon finds himself, when he's alone as he is now, to have his thoughts wander. Ever since falling into Master... err, Lord Ramsay Snow's care - not a Bolton, _he'll never be a Bolton_ \- there has been plenty of time for him to gather his thoughts and direct them to some sense. Watching his kennel girl fall to her death - Theon is proud, he did a service to Sansa even though she didn't ask for it - gave him pleasure, a sense of freedom, to then it all fall back by the time _The Silence_ came screaming down upon he and Yara's ship.

It's been several years since he's seen a battle, mayhaps not since The Whispering Wood when Robb caught the Kingslayer and his band of foolish Lannister soldiers. Theon mourns Robb every day, though sometimes his pleas for forgiveness go unanswered. _The things I've done to wrong my family... your family, they are unforgivable._ Jon's warm hand against his cheek, telling him that he doesn't need to choose... he hasn't had someone give him that same fiery look of inspiration in quite some time, not since Sansa, Yara, or Robb.

He admires his sister for being the brave beast of a fighter that she is, where her anger consumes her but causes her not to fall, not to fail and succumb to what weaker men see and scramble for the hills. The look of utter disappointment on her face when he leaps over the ship into the waters below as everything that once scarred him takes hold will forever haunt his remaining days, whether it be from a Winterfell execution block, Euron's sword in his back, or the murkiness and eventually polarizing cold of the seas below.

Theon finds Sansa to be someone inspiring to him, in a particular light where he knows that she isn't a fighter like his sister with a sword to someone's throat, but in a same likeness of withstanding even the worst pain. When Ramsay touches her, Theon feels a burning anger course through him. That vile, brutish monster is touching _his_ sister, in all but name. How dare he desecrate a girl who is only kind and wishes to be happy again. Theon wonders how she's doing now, having heard from Jon how he left her in charge of Winterfell when he left for Dragonstone, to be told that Arya is alive and kicking the shit out of someone or something.

He smirks to himself, doing this a lot more these days where a slight twinge of confidence breaks through like it did back to when he had been getting the pulp beat out of. A confidence that surges upwards and howls, a mix of a direwolf and a kraken beast that latches onto its prey, suffocating the foe with its tentacles, a ferocious jaw ripping open the prey's throat... Theon senses a revenge in his bones, but he does not know who it is directed to.

Someone joins Theon at his perch, noticed by the subtle shift of the wood under their feet, and a raucous cough that causes the Greyjoy prince to stir. _A prince in everything but name._ Theon looks at the lad before him, a little skinnier than him, only a few inches shorter than him, but a look of pride that almost is heartening.

"Captain," the lad nods respectfully, stilling in his spot, nervous to approach.

Another sense of pride flows through Theon's veins at the mention of being called a captain. He hadn't noticed the boy on the beach when he took to gathering support in rescuing Yara, but a few other Ironborn on Dragonstone had hopped on, perhaps this boy is to be one of them. "Do I know you?" Theon asks him.

A flush of color hits the boy's cheeks, and he looks down at his feet. "No. I don't think so."

"What's your name?"

"Kolby."

Theon raises an eyebrow. "Just... Kolby?"

The boy, Kolby, flushes with embarrassment again. It reminds Theon of some squire for some Westerlands lord, or a Crownlands lord who barks and bites at their squire with every mistake they make, to reprimand them with a rod instead of stern words. The blushing, the looking down at their feet, the constant apologies... he almost finds it endearing. Theon is slightly puzzled, however, as he is certainly not the man he used to be, when he had a smirk everywhere he went, demanding respect as if he had done something to garner it... he shouldn't be instilling awkwardness in this Kolby lad.

"It's a hard last name to pronounce..." Kolby says. "It's... it's Pyke."

Theon nods. _Pyke. Kolby Pyke. A bastard of the Iron Islands._ "You're a-"

"A bastard," the boy nods, looking up at the sky shamefully.

The Greyjoy prince looks out on the water, then back at the boy, lowering his chin down. Something fatherly rises in Theon, though he hardly will ever consider this lad a son of his - by the Drowned God, they must only be just three or four years apart at any moment - it is almost as if he can see the sadness in the boy's eyes. Just a lad, not an Ironborn man as not every man with a cock in the Iron Islands can be as strong and cruel as Euron, and slightly tamer than Theon, but a boy all the same.

"I know of someone who has a special place in his heart for bastards, cripples, and broken things," Theon says, looking at Kolby in the eyes. "Perhaps you should meet the Hand of the Queen."

Kolby breaks a slight smile, looking abashed. "Thank you," he nods his head. "My lord."

Theon crosses his arms, leaving the stirring feeling of uneasiness below stand still. "What can I do for you?"

"We're approaching Pyke, Captain."

That brings the prince to raise his eyebrows. He hadn't expected to get there so soon, having to sail all the way around the south side of Dorne and up the western side of Westeros. It's been a few weeks since he had departed from Dragonstone with Daenerys's blessing and a new found courage to rescue his sister, and though he has set sail several times in his life, it is as if his ship has been spurring through the waters with a speed unknown to him. The Drowned God gives favor to him, most certainly.

 _What is dead may never die._

 _"Unless you have already died a long time ago, Reek," a chilled voice whispers up against his back._

Theon shudders, turning away from Kolby. The voice stays latched onto the hairs of his neck, scaling down his spine like a flaying knife that takes bit by bit, piece by piece until the prince is revealed to be a man terrified of his own shadow, tortured by the beasts of the dark that snarl at him in the shadows. Wolves with golden eyes, a lioness who bares her teeth, a man doused in gold that jousts a lance through his heart... Theon bites down on his tongue to stop him by uttering a curse.

Kolby's presence still stays behind him, as if the lad is uncertain whether he should leave.

"Kolby," Theon says out loud, randomly, after a few moments of silence. "How old you are you?"

"Fifteen, my lord."

Theon widens his eyes. Much younger than him, at this point, then. "Have you ever fought in a real battle?"

"No- no, my lord."

The prince looks down at his hands, scarred hands with dried blood on them, cuts and lacerations around the wrists that snag at his heart strings, sinew and tar that bury skin deep with a prophylactic tenacity. Coagulated blood sliming through the openings of his fingers, a blade unsheathed, down it goes, sawing, _sawing_ through the flesh and sent away in a tiny box.

He sends Kolby a sympathetic gaze, patting the lad on the back. It is extremely heart warming to Theon that this boy, this fifteen year-old bastard child has never fought in a real battle, and yet volunteered to go with the prince to save the rightful queen of the Iron Islands. Yara's safety is paramount, yet Theon feels, deep down, slightly responsible for the boy should his death happen while fighting.

One of Lord Varys's birds whisper on the wind that Euron Greyjoy is in fact nowhere near Pyke or anywhere close to the Iron Islands, his reach is as far away from Theon as it can possibly be. Somewhere in Essos, ferrying a group of sellswords across the Narrow Sea, though Varys admits that their purpose is still a mystery for why they came to Westeros. Theon's logical thought process is that Ceresi had already bought them into her standing army and would use them alongside House Lannister's bannermen to fight off the White Walkers.

Under the guise of night, as Theon notes that the sun is starting to low, giving the Ironborn rescuing Yara fleeting shadows as their cover, and with Euron being out of the area, there's no other perfect time to strike.

Theon goes down to the deck, hand on the hilt of his sword, feeling the warmth of the receding sun flow through him, tasteful, happy, warm, and reminding him of the good times in his life to where everything had been much easier then. Only avoiding Lady Stark's withering, distrusting glare is the worst of Theon Greyjoy's problems before the boar hunt, a poisoned wine, a wildling woman, a war that no one in Westeros deserved, a raven, a burnt crow, Ser Rodrik, and so much more.

He rests his hands now on the bow of the ship, up right by the very front of it, to stare out at the horizon. A high rise island is spotted out far away, miles out at the very least, but close enough to where Theon can hear Yara's heartbeat, can sense her waning strength start to lower given whatever torture she is under. So close to home, so close to his family, and there's no turning back now.

Theon Greyjoy admits, that once, he was a scared little boy who only sought the approving love of his father. A scarred man of the Iron Islands, feeling like a bastard with all of the wrought disappointment.

He is no longer that same Theon Greyjoy.

He failed his sister once.

He shall never fail her again.

* * *

 _ **Yara Greyjoy**_

Yara counts the number of seconds it takes the guard on duty to be relieved. Some simpering dolt who thinks this'll earn him Euron's favor, as if the Crow's Eye favor is anything to be seeking in this corrupted and twisted world, she deduces to herself, and that makes him easy to take out. Currently, one of her arms is chained to a bed, the other free but only giving her so much room to wiggle and reach about.

The guard glares at her, but she does not say anything. She's not in the mood for another beating, to have a guard's fists come down on her and pummel her face into a pulp. Euron does not care whether or not his food - she scoffs at being called such a demeaning term, _food_ \- is spoilt or not, all that matters is that they're alive so he can twist the knife in further whenever he returns.

Her sense of strength and bravado crumbles after being paraded through the streets of King's Landing, rotten vegetables and food being thrown at her with a leash around her neck that her cunt uncle tugs on to prove his dominance over her. _A false king does not beat out a kraken._ Yara reminds herself this constantly, that eventually Euron will either die by drowning, an ironic fate of an Ironborn, or Theon will come to rescue her and drive a spike between his eyes.

She only hears of what the old Bolton bastard did to her brother, yet to see any scars down below, though she's seen his 'pretty pecker' that had been removed. Yara remembers when she is eying her brother, stuffed in some cage like a foul mutt that hardly deserved to be corralled there. She leaves her father's anger and bitterness behind, sails to the Dreadfort, and claims to rescue her brother back. _He's a Greyjoy, he'll forever be a Greyjoy._

The girl is hungry, but asking for food will only learn a slap across the face. She's slowly learning her place, to whimper and to scream as the hands latch onto her every night, sometimes one man, sometimes twenty, but it is the same sort of punishment for going against the rightful king of the Salt Throne. She wants to scream that is hers, that she's Balon Greyjoy's heir and all that will come from their mutiny and insurrection is pain and suffering. Something blocks the syllables from her throat, a stickiness that breaks, but she has a tongue, she can speak, yet there are cuts lining the wall of her throat that make stuttering painful should it be syllables that a damaged throat strain to make.

She eyes the guard with disgust. He's a newer one, as the older ones who have watched her for weeks seem to be grim, older, covered in sweat stains, blood, and their own vile seed. A young, dumb lad who is earning his spot on the totem pole, as if he could hardly hurt a fly let alone the future queen of the Iron Islands. Easy for her to kill, perhaps.

Yara, although disappointed in Theon, has come to terms with her foreboding silence and imprisonment that it is the best option. He's only just recovered from years of torture and complete identity annihilation by a man that is capable of fending off an Ironborn attack and being able to damage the cockiest son of a bitch alive. With Euron's blade at her throat, where even the bobbing of the skin causes pain, Theon is given an ultimatum. Charge and both be killed, or dive into the waters, fitting to be a coward and lose all he's built hope.

" _It's just a phase,"_ Yara tells herself. " _Theon is smarter than that to leave me behind._ "

Everything is going to plan, as she's got the leader of Dorne situated in her lap, lips locking, and the hull of _The Silence_ comes slamming into it with full force, and down the devil Euron swings, his face as mad as the Mad King, and then the carnage starts. Yara loses count of the number of men she cuts down, whether it be ten, twenty, or thirty, but it is a losing battle that can only be won once cutting the head off the lead viper.

She's heard tales of Euron's viciousness and strength in battle, but seeing it is another thing, and she's partially terrified and slightly in awe at the pure strength her uncle uses to fight. The blade hurts, his fists hurt, and Theon jumping into the water hurts even more.

There's whispers along the wall of how Euron Greyjoy is to be married to Ceresi Lannister, the 'queen' of the Seven Kingdoms who only has a hold on three, if that, and that there'll be demon spawn running around with bright hair and dark hair, emerald eyes and crazed smiles, and be the most vicious children in the entirety of Westeros.

Yara looks over at the guard one more time, putting on a frown. She knows that Euron is not on Pyke, or anywhere near the Iron Islands. She'd be feeling his presence running through the halls, with his cackling laugh, and his talk of good hands and other spiteful things that he does in hoping someone does indeed kill him. A throb in her heartbeat does roar to life, warm and burning, fiery and true.

 _Theon._

 _Theon is on his way._

She makes a pained sound, as if the shackle is hurting her wrist, which it is.

The guard looks over at her. "What do you want?" he hisses.

"Could you latch the other arm instead?"

"And why would I do that?"

Yara's eyes flash, and she's twisting the chain in her hands, feeling around with her fingers. She hasn't found what she needs yet, but she'll get there, and when she does... the boy will better watch out. She tries flirting, batting her eyes. She's never had a taste in men, and now that she's been subjected to their lowest ways - Daenerys's words come back to her, at their first meeting in Meereen, _no raping, no pillaging, no stealing, no plundering..._ \- but perhaps twisting one just right. "If you switch chains... I won't resist..."

The guard's eyebrows raise, and Yara resists the urge to smirk. There is always one way to make a man the most vulnerable, to spike interest in the worm wiggling between his legs and give it praise as if it is an entire other person who deserves a title. And the simple rise of the guard's eyebrows proves an interest, and Yara's point. This guard is nothing more than a teen, a man perhaps, but certainly one that has never laid. Now, he is going to get the chance to sleep with the great queen of the Iron Islands, and he's going to start keeping score.

Yara makes a face, and the guard's neck turns red. He slowly approaches her, grabbing the left chain and her left wrist, locking them in place. _Just a little bit more._ He goes to unlock the right one, to give Yara some breathing on her wrist, when she snaps.

Her fingers latch around the rusted nail that juts out of the manacle, breaking it free. With her now free hand, she dives the nail straight into the guard's throat. The guard sputters out of surprise, blood spraying everywhere, Yara slashing the knife left and right in his throat until it is a jagged mess of flesh and bubbling crimson dots on the guard's lacerated throat. The poor boy falls back against the wall of Yara's cell, holding a hand to his throat with a gaze that'll be one of betrayal, as if she's betrayed every once of trust he must've had in her. Blood pours out of the wound in his throat, Yara's ragged breath filling the silence followed by the quietness of the guard's dying cries.

She rips the other unlocked manacle off of the wall, her wrist breaking free from that one too. It falls to the bed with a soft _putt_ noise, Yara slinking off the bed. A few of her limbs are in a burning agony from being sore from the nights before, but she is not going to become some sniveling weakling and simpering woman with her pride and name humiliated or thrown into the dirt.

Yara takes the sword from the guard's sheath, going to the door handle and pulling it open. Another guard stands outside, perhaps to relieve the other guard on duty when the time comes. He looks at the room with a void expression, to rush in at seeing the blood spilled along the floor, the bed empty, the manacles broken. He barely has time to utter a cry when Yara sends the other guard's sword through his spine, the other guard screaming in pain before falling over, dead.

The girl steps out into the hall, looking both ways to make sure that coast is clear. It's been a long time since she had been thrown into that room, never to leave the bed and only to stare at the men who came in to beat her, humiliate her, or purely watch her as they were bored themselves.

The rest of the hall is empty, as Yara creaks slowly down a winding staircase from a tower. Silence is hanging over Pyke, where only the sound of the churning waters below fill the quietness, as if no one has heard her kill two of the guards and plan her own rescue to Theon's arms, where she knows he's waiting for her. It is eerie for her, too little noise, and too much time for paranoia to settle in.

She stills, several shadows elongating along the torch lit walls. Swords are drawn from the skinnier shadows that extend from clear bulks of men. Yara cannot hear any voices, only the shuffling of feet. Crouching low, she lets out a battle cry, swinging around the corner.

 _CLANG!_

Her voice catches in her throat as she realizes who her sword has made contact with, the other person she tried to attack stumbling back in surprise. Yara lowers her blade, eyes unable to comprehend what she is seeing. The person she nearly beheaded lowers his weapon too, the steel blade dyed a putrid crimson, a scraggy, bearded face with eyes that are beginning to pool with tears, and a face she'll never, _ever,_ forget.

"Theon..." Yara whispers, her voice impossibly soft.

The face of her brother, beleaguered and battle hardened, tears threatening to spill down his face as well... her _brother,_ her only remaining, surviving sibling has come to save her.

She races toward him, throwing her arms around him in a hug. He hugs back, and the two have their shadows clash in a familial embrace under the torch light.

"You're safe..." Theon says to her, keeping her close. "You're safe..."

Both Yara and Theon may be scarred children of the Iron Island, but their name still breaths the air. It is time for their revenge.

 _What is dead may never die._

 _Theon and Yara Greyjoy have returned to the game._

* * *

 **There we are ladies and gents! That was Chapter #4: Scarred Pikes. I used that title as a play on words with the title a bastard is given, for both remaining Greyjoy siblings in Season 7 just had been crapped on from Yara losing the sea battle, and Theon succumbing to his Reek tendencies. Though I imagine that on the show, Yara's rescue may end up in a completely different manner, with perhaps Euron being there or someone ending up dead, I do believe Yara would find a way to escape out of a cell on her own.**

 _ **Next Chapter P.O.V: A Golden Leader**_

 **Thank you all so much for reading! Please review! I love you all very much! Have an amazing day! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	5. Chapter 5: Arbor Gold

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Phantoms of Ice and Fire, Chapter #5: Arbor Gold. Last chapter was from the P.O.V of Theon and Yara, Theon saving his sister from Euron's clutches on Pyke. Now the attention is to shift over to the Crow's Eye, King of the Iron Islands, and the captain of the Golden Company, an - in the first draft, OC, but with the knowledge of the show - its version of Captain Harry Strickland, whom I know is vastly different in the books. For those wondering about the Daenerys and Jon chapters, don't worry, Chapter #6 is a Dany chapter, so just wait a bit longer. We're now halfway through Arc 1, as there is a lot that has to be set up for this sort of story. I'm so taken away by all the views I've gotten, so thank you so much. Enjoy Chapter #5: Arbor Gold.**

* * *

 ** _Harry Strickland_**

" _Does he ever shut up?"_

That is the captain of the Golden Company, Harry Strickland's, first thought to himself in the current conversation with Euron Greyjoy, the king of the Iron Islands, and supposedly one of the most dangerous men in the Seven Kingdoms. That didn't necessarily mean Essos or anywhere else in the world, now did it? The captain sits in a rather large chair in his quarters, Euron parading around the room with his hands outstretched, smiling and laughing away with a cocky grin to boot. Harry rolls his eyes. He's seen this too many times before; jumpstarts or cutthroats who believe they're so much better than what they're actually worth and when the truth comes out, it is shocking and damaging to say the least. As Harry listens to the Crow's Eye banter and banter on who knows what, he observes him.

It's the tactician part of his mind, the man can't help it. An instinct that lies low in him, a whisper that sends chills down his spine, an insatiable itch that cannot be scratched away no matter how deep the nails go, no matter how red the skin turns, and no matter how much blood is spilled from broken, porcelain like skin. It is what Harry does when he's bored, yet it is the same action he takes when he's interested, as he never knows when there'll be an upcoming fight. Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.

It's a shame, however, Harry deduces as Euron continues marveling on how he burned the Unsullied's ships, or nearly slit the throat of his niece, that his enemies list is always short for they're simply all dead - if by his own hand or someone else's, they're not around any longer and that is the point - so he has to find new ones. It can range from the little lowborn girl who gives him a dirty look, or his new employer that tries touching him in places that a man shouldn't have touched.

Harry takes a moment to leave his own thoughts behind and listen to Euron.

"You ever fought a Dornish person?" Euron, Crow's Eye, the apparent Drowned God, asks, leaning back up against one of the cabin's shelves with his arms crossed, body all dressed in leather. His dusty oak hair is short and scraggy, like the cragged lines of a cave, with his eyes ferociously glowing. Harry finds it all amateur.

"Of course," he says at length.

"I've killed two."

"Really?" Harry raises an eyebrow, although it is moreso him mocking the other warrior than actually being surprised at the information. "I've killed hundreds. But it's just a number, after all," he sniffs.

Euron narrows his eyes at him, the captain's gaze back is unflinching. "We may be working together, but I don't have to like you."

"I was thinking the same thing. I'm employed by the Queen, Cersei Lannister, to deal with Stark wolves and Targaryen dragons. Anyone else involved is all collateral; Ironborn weren't included. And I wouldn't say I've been all that moved by your theatrics, either."

The king of the Iron Islands places a hand at the hilt of his sword. "You say something like that again and I'll-"

"You'll what?" Harry looks up at Euron admonishingly, as if he's a child, batting his eyes and making a downturned frown all for the purpose of rubbing it in. "Kill me? If you do that, there's twenty-thousand men you have to deal with. Or you die from the injuries I inflict on you, that's a possibility. Say you survive and head back to King's Landing. What's waiting for you there? A queen who burns people alive for those who betray her. You just murdered her last chance of staying afloat in this game; you're a dead man."

Euron sneers. "I killed em both with their own weapons," he snarls. "A spear in the chest, and choked the other to death. You like all your fancy knives. Let me use them to slice your skin off, layer by layer!"

"Plan to enact on those threats?"

"Are you going to sit here and wait?"

The tension in the room can be sliced by a knife, it lays on Harry's skin like a plague that causes more itching and blistering and festering until nothing remains but scaled and burnt flesh. Euron's hand encircles the hilt of his sword, Harry tightening his own hands around the knives at his waist side. Both men eye each other, yet neither makes a move or speak. Harry relaxes his hold on the blades, but stays alert.

"You're a killer," he says after a moment. "You do it without hesitation."

"And so do you."

"I'm a _fighter,_ " Harry corrects. "There's a difference." He stands up, getting right in Euron's face. The smell of salt and sand and gravel and the coarseness that is the musk of a man fills his nostrils, but the captain of the Golden Company has smelt worse in his years of travel. A rotting child in the sun on the road to Meereen, a corpse that Harry is forced to remove body parts from, a fill full of fecal matter in one of the Free Cities... he's seen a lot. "I fight when I'm hired to do so, paid when I fight, and then I _leave._ Killing isn't in my personality, but I do it as what our contracts state. You? You do it because you enjoy it."

"You've enjoyed killing," Euron grins wildly, lowering his sword hand as well. "Don't lie, captain. You love killing just like the rest."

"Says a madman." Harry turns around to go and lie down on the bed in his cabin, refusing to listen to Euron's sputter. "Leave."

Euron does as he's told, with a grunt and groan, but not before grasping a golden goblet perched on another wall. He chucks it at Harry, hoping to have it hit the captain in the head. It wouldn't be an item that'd knock a man out or leave bruising, but in the Crow's Eye's rage, all he feels is the consumption of bitterness and pure carnal instinct. He throws it, balking back when Harry holds out his hand behind him and catches the goblet. Harry turns to look at Euron, an expression that almost mirrors amusement pearling from within his diamond stare.

"I-"

"Thank you," Harry smiles. "I was feeling particularly thirsty."

The captain of the Golden Company watches the king of the Iron Islands storm up above deck, muttering curses the entire way. Harry rolls his eyes, filling the goblet with a flush of Arbor Red inside a cask next to his bed. He sits on the edge of his bed, sipping away from its chalice, eyeing the room he's sleeping in. The walls are a fading, nearly withering old brown with stress marks in the wood. The items on the shelves rock from side to side occasionally in a lull of the water. He imagines people coming and going to be in his presence, as if they're phantoms that glide on the shadows and sit on the banisters. One person joins him, though Harry is incapable of speaking, he's incapable of moving; he is forced to witness, witness the consequences of short comings.

Her hair is like glass. Brittle, beautiful, chipped, broken, and strewn everywhere. Her eyes are reflective diamond pools full of emotion and happiness and truth, until they no longer stare at anything but an empty void and a beyond that is dark and depressing and there's nothing more than sorrow remaining. She has a laugh that is strong and vibrant, like a child filled with glee until her trachea is crushed inwardly, a silence pervading the land when the joy dies out. Syllables dissipate and her heart snaps, and there her body is laying on the ground like a broken rag-doll. Her eyes gaze upward past the heavens, past the stars, and the clouds, and into a beyond that is infinite and white and pure, where there's no sadness, no death, no crimson spilling around her.

The flaps of her neck are open wide, like a gaping mouth for a rodent to make its nest in, dry blood coagulating around the edges of flesh, bits of metal thrown in, and she's screaming, she's stuck while the monster devours her and the smell of copper rises above. Her voice gives out as the river of life drains from her very core. The ground goes from dark to darker to black to a pitch midnight that the crows land on. The skin rots away like paper mache, crumply and weathered, the flesh sagging from thin bones that come from a woman emaciated and tortured before her death. Her voice rebounds against the halls, full and strong, until there's nothing. Harry's wife is no more, and she'll never be anything again.

Her aura is seen racing down the halls like a wild horse let off its leash, a pearly white smile that is bitter and charcoaled and black. The child that has never existed is nestled in her arms as she kisses him to sleep, soothing him and rocking him until the sky darkens and it darkens forever, a light snuffed out until the end of time. The lullaby she whispers gets louder and louder and louder until it causes cracks in the molding and plaster, the house falling around her as the baby screams in pain, and she's laughing, laughing insanely, before another spell of quiet drowns everything else out. Her laugh dissipates on the wind, like water slowly coming to a trickle out of a faucet, rusty and molded into something grotesque like her body recovered from the wreckage.

Harry imagines that these are all the ways his wife may have died. He is stuck in his spot on his bed, wondering and wondering still where he failed. He wishes that he could draw her again, like he used to, a sketchpad and quill and a full well of black ink next to him as he's bent over a table, drawing away another picture of her while these thoughts come and go. At times, he'll draw a scar above her right eyebrow where he imagines a knife may have cut her open, leaving a battle wound that she never recovers from. Darwin is consumed by a hatred, crumpling the paper in his hand, tossing it over in the corner on the other end of the room for it to bounce around the weathered mahogany walls.

There's a silence that pervades the room, where Harry sits glumly in his chair, sniffling some, but still not crying. He can't cry now, not ever, and certainly not in front of that piece of shit Crow's Eye. The Golden Company has seen the commander cry more times than he can count on matters more trivial than that of a cat being stuck up in a tree, to waking up during Darwin's nightmares and calming him down. Harry scoffs at the fact that he's such a weak man mentally, with dreams and visions, yet he's banded together with some of these men for half of his adult life; emotion is nothing foreign to him nor his crew. This, however, is different. Harry doesn't know why, but it just is, a feel that is far different from anything he's ever experienced.

The day he's told of his wife's death is one he'll never forget. There is a rain in the sky. A darkness that settles gloomily over the Slaver's Bay city of Yunkai, the downpour relentless in its approach from the gray clouds to the scorched and sodden ground. Harry's horse needs a rest in the middle of the city's entrance, and he has to push it up onto a platform in the shade, in the rain with a few other bystanders that do nothing to help him. A child steals his lunch, he's late on a meeting with one of the Wise Masters, it is pouring, and he learns that his wife is dead.

As Harry sits in his spot whining away at his measly misfortunes, a child no older than nine or ten peeks around the corner. He notices her, sensing a slight level of apprehension, but he does not know why. He's not a craven, nor does he enjoy little girls or little boys; he's faithful, a strange concept for such a rogue warrior, but the sense of foreboding sadness lingers on the girl's atmosphere and he beckons her over.

Harry is told the news, and he breaks.

He wants to twist the neck of the person who hurt him and murdered his wife, in the same way she died as it'd be purely poetic and finally give the blonde man a sense of freedom.

The captain breaks his attention away, downing the rest of his goblet. A walk is in order, as that'll more than likely clear his head. There's never that much space to walk out on a boat, but a space nonetheless. He gets up, slamming the goblet down on a small table. Keeping one hand firmly around a singular knife blade - one of four on his body, the scenarios could be endless - Harry strolls up the steps.

He's hit by a burst of sunshine, the captain shielding his eyes away from the harsh rays; he's been below deck writing letters and papers and checking on stocks with his fellow sellsword fighters to take to the deck, so the sunlight is quite blinding to him. A familiar sea smell wafts along the airways, and he breathes it in, sighing contently. It's been a few years since he's been in Westeros, in Dorne had been his last visit, invited by Oberyn, the Red Viper, to perform in a tourney on Doran's nameday. He misses the sun and the warmth and the sand, and most of all, Oberyn's smirk. It's a rare thing; to taste a viper's venom and survive. Since then, his last interaction with that continent had been receiving a letter from the 'One True King' Stannis Baratheon come into his hands at one point, though he scoffs at the fact he would've joined a Baratheon's war.

"It's ironic," Harry says aloud to himself. "We refused to fight for Stannis yet we agree to fight for Cersei," he shrugs his shoulders. "She's paying more."

The captain finds Euron out by the bow, staring out at the water that glistens and gleams with more bursts of golden light caching onto peals and wakes of the waves. Harry is fascinated by water, the beauty of it all and the powerful hand it wields in death; he's heard stories of drowning, the pressure that fills your lungs as the gloominess drags you further and further beneath the depths. The coldness. Harry shudders. He prefers the heat. Out in the distance, the far distance, there's brewing clouds ahead, gray and turbulent and all too troublesome looking.

"We'll be at King's Landing in a few days," Euron says after a moment's silence. "You'll get to meet the queen."

Harry eyes the man, wanting to give a commonplace smirk. "The way you mention her title, it sounds as if you love her."

That causes the Crow's Eye to scoff, bowling over in laughter. Harry raises an eyebrow at the pure wildness being put on display for him as Euron claps the side of the boat with a hand, eyes squeezed shut in his raucous bellow. "Love her?" Euron jests. "She's a pretty woman, I'll give ya that! But love her? She's in love with her brother! She won't be in love with me, and I won't be in love with her."

"That must be the very first time you've never gotten something you wanted."

"I want to kill you."

"Nothing is stopping you, _lord_ Euron," Harry says, putting a point emphasis on the word 'lord'.

Euron swivels around with a glare. "Lord? I'm a king."

"Are the Iron Islands independent from the crown?" No response. "Cersei granted you your title?" A lack of an answer. "See, lord Euron, if Cersei loses and we're all to perish, and that Targaryen girl wins, that'd make out your death, wouldn't it? I don't think an enemy would leave you alive, at least not as a king. And since there's no independent Iron Islands, you truly can't be a king of anything, can you?" Euron's hand dares to draw steel. "I dare you. We've been through this before."

The Crow's Eye steps right up to Harry, almost like deja vu just a few moments earlier down below deck. Euron grips the captain by the lapels of his jacket, pulling him close, almost so close that the captain is kissing him. He has half the mind to; it wouldn't hurt to taste the fearsome Kraken before his funeral pyre, would it? Euron's bristly beard tickles against Harry's chin, and he's holding in a sneeze.

"Mouth off to me again, and it won't matter if you have ten men or twenty-thousand," Euron warns. "I'm killing ya," his breath is hot on Harry's face, but the captain of the Golden Company stays kempt and stalwart, enjoying the twinkle in Euron's eyes as he lets go of him. Euron turns back to face the bow, ignoring the other man for whatever it is worth. "Fuckin' twat..." Euron mutters to himself.

Harry's hands still haven't left the bow, fingers tugging onto splotched wood. His mouth is dry, his taste buds missing another delightful glass of Arbor Red.

He envisions himself swimming in the water, this Narrow Sea, with his wife, and their unborn child, but it is to come at a cost.

A war must be won first.

Captain Harry Strickland is not necessarily a man of knowledge, but he does know this.

He's going to win this war for the Lannister queen, defeat the Starks and the Targaryens and the whole bloody lot of the Westerosi fools, and then he'll settle down mayhaps, leave the devices of a black and battled over world behind him.

Nothing is going to get in the way of his vision.

* * *

 **There we are everyone! That was Chapter #5: Arbor Gold. I hope you all like our only main character OC, Harry! I haven't written an OC in awhile, and since this is Game of Thrones after all, I imagine there is some character that'll be the figurehead of the Golden Company since there hasn't been one yet, here's a chance to make one. - Redact as clearly this Harry Strickland is an OC of technicality, different from the books Harry Strickland - And since he's technically a villain - after all he's fighting for Cersei - I want to my best to humanize them slightly; Euron and Cersei maybe not so much since they're like batshit insane and she's way too far gone at this point, but I digress. I am already in love with his attitude and his wits back at Euron, who I have always felt is like a spoilt child that is vengeful and wild and a little deluded at that.**

 _ **Next Chapter P.O.V: Stormborn**_

 **I think you all know who that is for the next point of view. Thank you so much for reading, and please review! I'd love to know what you thought. Have an amazing day! I love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	6. Chapter 6: Northern Dragons

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Phantoms of Ice and Fire, Chapter #6: Northern Dragons. We're finally getting our first Daenerys POV! I have found it extremely difficult when I have been writing this story to get all the points of view evenly spread out because there are a lot,** ** _whole_** **lot of characters, and I don't want to just write Jon, Daenerys, Arya, and Tyrion - I want to expound on that and give many points of view to many characters, which means some suffer and we don't hear from them, mastering a world of GoT is quite difficult. The last chapter we met our captain of the Golden Company, who's role has been adjusted to not be Harry Strickland from the books, but a representation of my own of him, somewhat based on the show and that Harry Strickland is of a different light. I am excited for the nearing end of this beginning arc, and then we'll carry into Arc 2 soon enough. Enjoy Chapter #6: Northern Dragons.**

* * *

 _ **Daenerys Targaryen**_

Her first view of Westeros is Dragonstone, with the high rise, formidable gray stone walls jutted out in spike-like formations. Her hands touch the sand and she rubs the particles between her fingers. She's returned to where home is, her birthing place, and a place full of so much more. Dragonstone on the horizon had seemed like a faraway dream to her, and now she's looking on to what else the rest of her kingdom will have to offer. She's surprised by the lack of snow, with it being winter and all. Snowfall had been recorded in King's Landing, to her surprise, and half of her heart is consumed by childish instincts. Where she's going, there's enough snow for an entire century to come and go.

Daenerys Targaryen, the rightful queen of Westeros, Protector of the Realm, the Unburnt, the Breaker of Chains, Khalessi of the Great Grass Sea, and the Mother of Dragons, and in the middle of it all, even with all of her titles, she feels like she's drowning. Nothing is going the way she had expected it. Though she does not believe there to be people waving dragon banners from high windows, or toasts to her health, she's expecting the paved road to be somewhat easier. Now she's lost a child of hers, there's another queen wallowing in her cups, an army of the undead marching on the very continent she wishes to rule, and her heart has once again been snagged.

" _He is not Khal Drogo,"_ she tells herself over and over again. Daenerys believed that she'd never find true love once more after her sun and stars. The man who proclaims to conquer a world that gives his people trepidation and fear, the man who she comes to love... and now he's usurped by a solemn Northman bastard, as if she could see the irony.

Jon Snow is better, but Daenerys does not entertain the thought aloud.

The bright white walls of White Harbor glisten over the open sea, a strong wind gusting over the waters, blowing her hair in the wind. There are a few spotted clouds, and she's puzzled as to why the tendrils of a long winter have not collided with an entryway of the North. It is cold, she cannot deny that, as cold gales flirt by. Yet, underneath the blue sky, and with the gusts of wind, Daenerys senses a tension that settles over her skin. It bristles, causing the hair on her neck to stand up, and she can taste it too, sour and bitter, a warning.

A massive shadow flies over the boat, a wingspan blocking out the sun. Daenerys' heart soars again, just a little, at the sight of her largest child, Drogon. The sun is doing glorious things to his scales, glimmering like obsidian, reflective onyx glass where hearths of fire pool underneath. Drogon lets out a screech that echoes to the surrounding vicinity. Though they've sent ravens ahead, Daenerys can imagine that all the warning bells in White Harbor are ringing by now, with arches lining the walls and cowering in the sight of her fearsome beast.

She remembers long ago, back in Qarth, with a hand up to touch the face of Jorah Mormont of Bear Island a declaration. "They are my children," she whispers, "And they are the only ones I will ever have..."

Someone else joins her on deck, and it is not an unknown secret as to who the queen's companion would be. She looks behind her, taking her eyes off Drogon for a second, and smiles. "Lord Hand," Daenerys greets warmly. She often calls him by his true name, Tyrion Lannister, the Imp, the dwarf of Casterly Rock, and hand of the queen, but at times there are moments of distance between them where her tone is warm, yet rigid, and the words sourer still.

Tyrion bows to her, and with his stubby legs, waddles over to her. Daenerys knows that her hand is a man grown, with long locks and a beard, but she still finds that his movements given to his size can be that of a toddler; she hates to forget her manners, but a waddle is more consistent than his walk.

"Your Grace," he says, Daenerys noting that. No matter whether they are the only two alone in a room, he'll always call her by a title, and never anything familiar of the sort. _Dany,_ a voice on the wind calls out, and she shudders. The sellsword is back in Meereen, and she'll think of him no longer. Tyrion exhales, eyes squinting from the brightness. "A lovely morning. Where's all the snow?" She wonders the exact same thing. "This must be White Harbor."

"I believe so. When was the last time you were in the North?"

Tyrion pauses, frowning momentarily, as if he's entirely forgotten anything in his past. She can see the way the gears in his head turn, how they churn out a witty thought after another, yet all the while never stepping on her toes. "Years, Your Grace. A trip with Robert Baratheon up to Winterfell," he chuckles, and it is as if he's gone down a memory lane of sorts. "The last time I was here, my brother fucked my sister, I pissed off the top of the Wall, and there was Jon Snow."

She wrinkles her nose at the first line, excusing the crudeness of the statement. Though she does not get drunk, if rarely, Tyrion tells her on one of their first nights of trusted confidence about anything Lannister. The madness of a raving woman named Cersei with golden locks for hair and a lack of wits for brains. A brother, the Kingslayer, who screws his sister because there's apparently nothing better. When Daenerys hears mention of Jaime Lannister, she cuts Tyrion off with a swift glare and leaves it at that. She will not breathe more life into a name she cannot stand.

 _"One day,"_ she tells herself with finality, _"I'll learn the truth of the Kingslayer. Of Aerys, my father. About the saying... 'burn them all'..."_

Daenerys catches onto the last thing Tyrion mentions. Jon Snow. A bastard born in the South to the honorable Lord Eddard Stark, a raised in Winterfell under the cruel glare of Catelyn Stark, hastened to the Wall, a turned wilding, Lord Commander, ends up dead, and now rises as the King of the North. _Her_ King of the North, a thought that causes her to blush quite profusely.

She does not know what it is about Jon, as to why she is magnetically attached to him like so, but she does not have time to dwell on the inconsistencies of her thoughts. There are wars to win, and lives to save.

"Call everyone for a council, my lord," she instructs, walking off the deck. Daenerys longs for a period of quiet, a stasis of silence in her world filled with noise and men, and to also get away from the burning rays of sunlight.

Back in the safety of her own cabin, she sits down on her bed. Jon is not with her tonight, and he has not been for several prior. Though Daenerys knows it is no fault of her own, part of her is guilty, as there is uncertain doom rising on the horizon, yet she cannot see it. Jorah is back by her side, and though a flame never once rose out of the dark, she can see the pain evident on his face, the disproval. _But I am no child. I am a Khalessi, I am the Mother of Dragons. A dragon does not concern herself with the opinions of the sheep!_

Daenerys flinches, lips parting in absolved confusion. Where did that thought come from? She trusts Jorah with her life, with the lives of everyone on board, and yet she feels enraged by the possible idea of disproval? A history like hers and his is not one to be cast aside so easily by ramifications of other men. Drogon's roar outside is joined by another, and her brain speeds towards another thought. _Rhaegal._

She has not thought about Viserion in a long time, Daenerys realizes. These three dragons are hers, her children, and yet they only cross her mind whenever she hears or sees one of them. It pains her to know where Viserion is now; dead at the bottom of a frozen lake in a tundra of wild men and snarks that growl in the night. Though she does not look directly into the Night King's eyes, she can feel it underneath her skin, a malevolent chill that snaps her bones and twists her inside out, perilous and distraught she flees, lest her heart turns into ice. Jon's warning plays in her head over and over again.

 _The Great War is here. It is not between a few squabbling houses, but between the living and the dead._

Daenerys joins her council after a few more minutes of thinking. Dealing with Cersei Lannister had been nothing short of unpleasant, but as she faces the great North ahead of her, where a restless evil sleeps, it is not enough to tell herself to be brave and not follow by the very words.

Assembled around the table is Grey Worm, the captain of her Unsullied Forces, with his stalwart face, an expressionless one as he waits on his queen. Next to him is her translator, Missandei, a warm smile supplicating her features, and she bows to Daenerys when she enters. The rugged face of Jorah the Andal is next, and a look of emptiness greets her back, running Daenerys cold to the core. Varys the Spider follows, sheathed in layers and layers of robes, and yet she cannot read him, underneath the twinkling of his eyes. Ser Davos Seaworth has taken a spot next to Varys, but stands a distance away from him; once a vermin of King's Landing, always a vermin. Tyrion is looking at Daenerys the moment she walks in, and his face reads that of pride; she is the queen he chooses to follow, and she is the queen he will get to be on the Iron Throne. Last but not least, the kindred soul that he is, Daenerys stares into the eyes of Jon Snow. Darkening, soulful, lustful, she cannot tell.

Mutterings of 'good morning' and 'Your Grace' are passed all around, which she returns kindly. There are matters to be discussed, and they need to be discussed now rather than later.

"What news of the Dothraki?" she asks first. Varys had told her one solemn evening, sailing the Narrow Sea, of how the argument used to be that the Dothraki didn't cross the poison water. She makes her followers of her original _khalasar_ sail from Qarth to Astapor, and she remembers the sounds of retching into buckets, barrels, and over the side, and then the entirety of the Dothraki people travel across the Narrow Sea, and the journey is just as miserable, with dissension in the ranks, and Daenerys is powerless to make the expedition any faster. With having to sail from Dragonstone to White Harbor, though the proximity is nothing of the same insanity as Essos to Westeros, it is opted that the horse lords take the land in a fast ride.

Varys takes this first, bowing his head. "The horde had reached Moat Cailin just by the last full moon, and now are encamped about two hundred miles from Winterfell, Your Grace. There's been no mention of raping, pillaging, or violence detailing any of the sort, but for how long this'll last, I cannot say."

"Anything else?"

Jon clears his throat, lifting his head. "A raven had flown from Moat Cailin to White Harbor, and then delivered here to me," he says, and he lifts the scroll in hand. The seal is imprinted with that of House Reed, a black lizard-lion. The seal had been opened, the letter read. "It instructed me to give it to Lord Tyrion."

Tyrion is brought aback by this news, and he gingerly takes the scroll from Jon. He unfurls it, eyes scanning the text. Daenerys watches as his face cycles through a series of expressions that she cannot discern from, with a furrowed brow marking the end as the Imp throws the scroll onto the table in anger. "This is an outrage," he professes afterwards, and his eyes lock with Jon. "Why?"

The King in the North has no answer that can possibly put Tyrion at ease. "House Reed is a bannermen to House Stark. She probably did this thinking it'd tie in with my favor."

"What has happened?" Daenerys asks, gritting her teeth. She is the Mother of Dragons, a bringer of magic into the realm, and yet there are times when the conversation passes over her like water off a wing, and no one dares tell her anything. She is no longer a child, and she'll take what is hers by right.

"Meera Reed, daughter of Howland Reed, has taken up residence with a bit of their forces in Moat Cailin. A little under a week ago, Jaime Lannister with a companion rode there. She has taken him prisoner."

Daenerys feels her body consumed by rage, though she does not show it physically. Her eyes flare, and Tyrion's face creases in worry. No matter how hard she tries, it seems as if her wishes are undermined and the Kingslayer is constantly mentioned in her presence. She'd watch him burn for what he's done, and yet there is so much about him that she does not know. It hits her one evening after the summit in the Dragon's Pit that the man by Cersei's side is the Kingslayer, Tyrion's brother, and that the same man tried running her down in the second Field of Fire. Wherever she turns, the accursed golden haired man turns up and destroys what has been steadily built.

Her neck tenses up as she lifts her head. The Lannisters promised forces, and yet all is so far sent is the Kingslayer and one other man. "I thought the Lannisters were sending us their armies. Not just two men."

"I believe my brother commands their armies," Tyrion muses, and a bit of his composure seems to have fallen. "I know who he's traveling with, and two men is better than none, but..."

"What can be done about this?" Daenerys cuts her Hand off, and Tyrion's face twists into a darkening scowl.

Jon's look does not reassure her. "I can write back that he is to be freed and can go on his way to Winterfell. Or to go and retrieve the Westerlands men..."

Daenerys chews on the inside of her cheek, the bitterness of copper filling her mouth flush with blood as she bites. _You are a dragon. Be a dragon._ "May Lord Snow and I have the room?"

Missandei and Grey Worm are the first two to leave. Tyrion stands begrudgingly in his spot, hands clenched into fists by his side no doubt at his brother's imprisonment, but only leaves when Varys gently touches his arm. Jorah looks into Daenerys's eyes, and he knows, she knows that he understands what is to be said, and he bows out gracefully. Ser Davos does not move from his position, only at Jon's urging, and then the rulers are left alone.

She runs a hand across her forehead, strange as is that she's sweating despite being in the North where the winds are cold and chilled. Jon's hand rests on the pommel of Longclaw, but the tension in his shoulders visibly recedes back into his body. Daenerys sets her shoulders on the table, leaning forward, her silver hair half doused in shade and light.

"It hasn't even been one week and something has gone awry..." she complains.

"It can be fixed," Jon says, a hand touching her shoulder. "In one of Bran's letters, he spoke of her, Meera Reed. She was his protector for some time, she is a true Northmen."

"A Northmen halting our forward rush!" Daenerys jumps suddenly, exasperated. "And now, from the looks of things, all I've gotten is the Kingslayer and his companion..." her voice rises somewhat, and she feels like she's been transported to the Red Waste, starving, suffering, a child left alone in the world. She's the last dragon and yet all she can think about is how much she's undergoing in terms of pain. "Where do you think the Lannister forces are?"

"Not far behind. Perhaps Cersei set her brother ahead to pave the way for her men."

"Perhaps..." Daenerys bites on the inside of her cheek again, and she turns to look at him. "I- I've missed you these past few days."

"I have too."

"Why do you not stay with me in the evenings?"

"It'd cause the others to talk."

"So? If you and I care for each other, than there shouldn't be a problem?" Daenerys cups the side of Jon's face, making him lock eyes with her. Hers are radiant, soulful blazes of a dragon laying in hiding, where Jon's smolder and smoke, born amidst salt and fire, and in them are the years of battles, betrayals, deaths, and victories both have encountered. She kisses him, and he kisses her back, yet she can feel there's a troubled pause from when their lips connect. She parts back, voice impossibly soft. "What's the matter?"

"We're in the North now," Jon mentions, but Daenerys finds it quite silly that he repeats himself, it is all she has heard since departing from Dragonstone. "Our relationship cannot be known knowledge..."

"I-" Daenerys looks away, as if the thought hadn't even crossed her mind.

Jon continues, furthering her hesitancy. "Before I left for Dragonstone, the dissent could be felt seeping through the Great Hall. Nearly every northern lord disagreed with me meeting you, as well as lords of the Vale besides."

"The North remembers..." she whispers, and her arms prickle with goosebumps.

"I love you," he says, kissing her again. "I always will love you, but I do not think it is right for the Northern lords to know we're together. It may... sour things."

"You'd think they would be grateful..." Daenerys lets out a nervous laugh.

Jon, the ever sullen man that he is, does not return the jest. "We're a proud people, and anything will turn their hearts to stone." He straightens out his back, hand going back to rest on Longclaw's pommel. "May I leave to my cabin, Your Grace? There are a few letters I must write."

Daenerys nods, holding his hand for another moment longer in hers. She feels the drum of his heartbeat as a pulse in his fingers, the throb that vibrates on her own palm, a warm kiss that fades to a lingering whisper, the taste of wine after leaving the throat as she watches Jon leave. She loves him, that she knows, and she's known it for quite some time. He says that he loves her, and his actions show it, yet all Daenerys has come to terms with is more of the Northern cold.

She is a dragon, a dragon walking into the freezing, alienating cold.

If she has to burn them all, then she will burn them all.

A dragon does not bend the knee so easily.

* * *

 **I am really enjoying her point of view, I must say, first and foremost. There we are ladies and gents, that was Chapter #6: Northern Dragons, of Phantoms of Ice and Fire. I have been doing a lot more reading of fanfiction between Jon/Dany, and I've decided to take a little bit of a twist with them, seen here, that things are to be polarizing. Season 8 may be entirely different than what we believe. Getting inside Daenerys's head has been fun, and it gets even more enjoyable the further along the story goes, as there's something eating away in the back of her mind. She is still a child, youthful adult really, in the grand scheme of things, like Jon, like Sansa, like Arya, and there are many beaten paths she must continue to go down before she finds some sanctum and peace.**

 _ **Next Chapter P.O.V: Mother of Madness**_

 **I also believe you know who this will be. I don't know what it is, but the female characters in Game of Thrones are just so much fun to write; I haven't felt this excited about a cast of female characters in literature or film since Princess Leia... but any who. Please review and let me know what you thought. I love you all so much, and thank you for being patient with this late update. I hope you have an amazing day. Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	7. Chapter 7: Rains of House Martell

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Phantoms of Ice and Fire, #7: Rains of House Martell. The point of view we're hearing from is Cersei Lannister everyone, our lovely Mother of Madness, and even though I strongly dislike her in terms of villainy, her character is freaking brilliant and of course Lena Headey does an amazing job portraying such a nuanced, gorgeous character. I hate to love her and I love to hate her, but I digress. Last chapter was our first Daenerys chapter and she has established that there are troubles abound and Tyrion now knows of Jaime's capture, things to come from there. But, this is a Cersei chapter ladies and gents. Enjoy Chapter #7: Rains of House Martell.**

* * *

 _ **Cersei Lannister**_

There's a storm approaching. Thunder bellows out over Blackwater Bay, high above in the squalls where the gray clouds battle. Jeweled fingers tap against a windowsill, eyes scanning out over a dominion covered in a feeling of solemnness. Queen Cersei of the House Lannister, rightful queen of the Andals and the First Men, First of Her Name, and Protector of the Realm - _titles,_ _oh the titles_ \- stands in her room, perched high above the streets of King's Landing, a god in her own eyes, a god feared by the tiny people down below.

It has been a strange few weeks in King's Landing, the Crownlands are eerily quiet since the departure of the Dragon Queen whore and the Northern bastard, but Cersei never stays quiet forever. She wonders, though at a distance as she doesn't want to seem too interested, where they are now, those two massive armies. Did keeping them in the dark do anything for her self image?

" _Of course it did,_ " she tells herself in moments of doubt, clenching a wine glass yet not actually drinking any of the wine. " _I am the Queen._ "

Her father's words - the ever so mighty powerful Tywin Lannister - ring in her head like the bells rung with a city under siege, a dead king, or a wedding. _I don't mistrust you because you're a woman. I mistrust you because you're not as smart as you think you are. Any queen who must say 'I am the Queen' is no true queen._ Cersei's lips turn back into a cruel smile, and she almost wants to laugh at the absurdity of her father's words. He didn't even get to die of old age, but a bolt to the heart. Where does he lie now? A body sinks into the dirt of Casterly Rock, now abandoned and an empty husk of the glorious ancestral seat it may have once been. All that remains of the fearful, roaring lion that is Tywin Lannister is ashes, and blood seeping into the soil.

The wind is salty, and Cersei has heard no word from Euron Greyjoy in quite some time. She smirks to herself, at the thought of a rugged sea pirate with an eye-patch and a gravely voice somehow coming to sweep her off her feet. As if. Cersei is a queen, not some broodmare or fair maiden who swoons at the dumb songs written by even dumber bards. The whore Sansa would still be like that, she probably _is_ still like that.

She has not thought about her in a long time. Cersei hears the prophecy over and over in her head - _a younger, more beautiful will come to cast you down_ \- and immediately seizes Sansa up and down at that absurd Winterfell feast, with the bat Catelyn Stark sitting next to her, crowing and crooning like all boring women do. Cersei takes one good look at the kissed by fire girl and sees her for the meek dove, the weak-minded, naïve little girl she is, and has no idea how this could be her mortal enemy, her fate somehow intertwined with her. Then cast aside is Sansa, a ragdoll that not even a dog would want, but out comes another.

 _Oh, Margarey Tyrell. Gods have their cruel jokes._

Somewhere in the back of Cersei's mind, she believes once upon a time she could befriend this doe-eyed golden rose, somehow, with a good bit of fortune. It all comes crashing down, and she's never appreciated the emerald lick of flame that wildfire brings more than she has in her entire life than in that single, momentary instance. _Gold their crowns, and gold their shrouds._ She does not plan for the long term and does not assume that her baby boy is to jump from a window mere minutes after... but the witch's words have never been spoken more true.

Riding on the wave of flames, comes the silver-haired dragon queen, Daenerys Targaryen, and Cersei realizes then and there she had been wrong the entire time. This is her enemy, this is her mortal flesh wound, and she decides that she will do all in her power to cast aside the foreign traitor and the armies that march with her. As she crumbles the Tyrells, as the crumbles the Martells, as she crumbles the Starks, the dragons will see that not even wildfire shall spare them.

Her goal had been to light the Dragon Pit up ablaze, let their screams simper onto the wind and then live in a new era of wealth and supremacy, but Jaime and Qyburn both express distaste at the idea, and she gives up in its relent. Betraying them is so much better, the rug has pulled from out underneath their feet.

Cersei clenches an empty wine glass in her hands, moreso holding it just as if it is like a lifeline, a tethering rope to keep her from tumbling off the edge. Her head lowers down to stare at her stomach, which is starting to swell even more now, and Cersei grins. This is the last piece of the world she wants. A dynasty for the child she is carrying, for her son Joffrey - she knows this will be his name, no golden boy hero to dissuade her otherwise - and there will be trumpet sound day and night, the bells will toll, and Cersei will keep the Lannister legacy roaring long after she's gone.

She hasn't had one sip of wine since Tyrion's visit into her chambers, and part of her is almost gladdened that she knows he hasn't lost his wits. There is comfort in seeing him again, but it is easily displaced by fueling rage at the horrors he has brought to her family. He is responsible for father's death, and he is partly responsible for Myrcella's demise as well, having made the stupid and foolish plan in the first place. He is her only comfort, in the time where Tyrion is acting Hand, Tywin occupied with the Northern host, and Jaime stuck in some howling wolf's cage... and Ceresi leaves the memory as an afterthought.

The queen walks back to her bedside, moving away from the window as the air starts to heat up, and the tension begins to build over her skin. Electricity crackles and pops over the waves, and little by little does the sun drown out in a grayscale cloud cover, and the rains will being to weep o'er these halls of King's Landing. Cersei stares at the bed, leaning against one of the pillars holding the monstrous structure up. There's an indent pressed down into it, from where she constantly sleeps, staying stuck on the left side where Tommen slept, as she can feel his presence radiating up from underneath. Away from her spot is nothingness, a flat surface, and the words still sting though the sound waves have long since then fluttered away.

 _I don't believe you._

How couldn't he? Cersei is still puzzled over the enigma presented, all that she has done for him, _her_ Jaime while he's been at home and away. All she has done has been for his safety, whether he wants to believe it or not. Had she spoken up about betraying the Stark-Targaryen alliance, knowing her brother's foolish honor that he claims exists, Jaime would speak and ruin everything. Their child together _is_ real, she cannot deny this fact, but she will never let him have a part in this boy's life, whether he be living or otherwise once the storm passes.

" _Could you do it?_ " her mind taunts daringly. " _Could you kill Jaime, your own kin, your own flesh and blood and the only one who matters in this world, if it really came down to it? Even if the pale fingers are pulling at your throat, could you kill him?_ "

Cersei does not know if she can do it. She doesn't know if she wants to ever, truly dwell on such a monstrous thought. Is it a monstrous thought, though? She is unable to decide. Normally, the world is black or white for Cersei, either it helps her, or it doesn't. Is Jaime's demise something that'd hinder or help her in the long run? Other decisions have been easy, like rain off of a wing - _Olenna Tyrell said that simile_ \- and Cersei no longer uses it in her daily vernacular. Her jeweled fingers tap against the one of the bed posts, and she peers at it with a frown. There's an amber stain deep in the paint, looked as if it had been scrubbed over and over with a wet cloth or brush to get the stain off.

It is incapable of being anything other than blood.

Cersei has not had any executions in her room since her becoming of Queen, and with a sad sigh, she remembers that Tommen was a too timid boy to perform any sort of brutality in the royal chambers. This amber stain - blood more like - belongs to Joffrey, there is no other possibility. The faces of her children flash by, in quick succession, one after the other, but not as bright and bubbly children that once were hers, but corpses, dead corpses that haunt and clash at her with bony fingers and hollowed out eyes.

Joffrey's face is twisted in a sadistic, cruel smile, the rivers of dried blood clinging to his face as he spits up poison and wine, still dressed in his beautiful golden red embroidery. His eyes are alit like a fire, burning and consuming, and there's no soul in them. Myrcella is next, with strands of hair as gray as the Northern snows, and there are drops of blood trickling out with a timed precision. Where did her lovely girl go? Tommen, _oh sweet Tommen,_ is last, and the sight almost makes Cersei vomit on the floors. Her precious baby boy is a figure with a neck bent far to the right for what is considered normal, eyes wide open, staring at a blue death filled with nothingness, blood lacerating his throat. However, his mouth is open, as if he is in the middle of speaking someone's name, and a chill slides through Cersei's body as she can practically hear the name.

 _Margarey. My wife. My love. His whore. My whore._

Rivets of emerald fire lace the curtains, turn the sky into smoke, and the joy of Cersei's destruction of the High Sparrow turns into ashes in her mouth.

Tyrion always said it, didn't he?

She looks away from the bed, a coldness surrounding her and embracing her like a long lost kiss of death. Jaime's desertion stings in all the places she's never believed could be hurt. How many times did she chastise her brother, the golden child? Insult after insult after insult yet he stays to her side, whimpering like a wounded puppy, clinging to her skirts, and Cersei's fingers lace down his spine, up his scalp, and inside his heart as she twists, keeping him tethered to him like a kite on a string. Yet the string is cut, snipped blindly, and the downfall is hard and vicious and bumpy; Cersei's still recovering.

There's the role of having a commander for her armies, as with Randyll Tarly's death by fire, and Jaime's desertion left vacant. Cersei ponders tirelessly over who would lead the Lannister forces that are to stay loyal to her. The Mountain is always her first choice, but he cannot speak, and he certainly cannot leave her side as being her personal bodyguard. She's heard rumors of the Golden Company's several captains. Their leader, Harry Strickland, is incapable of meeting her in person due to some injury sustained in a battle - she scoffs over empty wine glasses at Harry's propositions; how can a man lead a sellsword company if he despises fighting? - so she's nearly sent the second in command instead. Not as graceful as Strickland in the negotiation department, but picks up for that in spades with his fighting ability.

However, then, three days later, a second raven follows. Harry Strickland shall indeed grace King's Landing with his presence.

She snorts. If Euron and this... Harry fellow haven't killed each other, perhaps they'll be superior and competent commanders of the Lannister forces than what her own brother, her own twin would ever be.

A soft knock rouses her from her thoughts.

"Enter," she says and lets out a sigh. Being cooped up in the Red Keep for twenty plus years of her life has not been exactly what she calls the most thrilling of days. There's hardly anyone to talk to, except for Qyburn, who happens to be the man that has gently knocked on her door.

Her Hand and Grand Maester all in one - _titles, oh the pretentious titles_ \- stands in the doorway of the room, his golden pin of the hand placed on the top circle of his robe. His eyes are sunken in and his face is more weathered than the last time she saw him, which had been a little over a day ago. However, her faith in the man is undoubting, and the things he has done for her, in her name, she'll never be able to repay. Life is precious, and luckily, Qyburn knows every mannerism of it. Behind him is The Mountain, oh the mighty Ser Gregor Clegane. Their new armor, the black and silver one, gleams from the dying light streaming through the windows. The gray storm clouds continue to pile up; thunder roars in the distance, and Cersei savors every single millisecond of noise.

It is as if her husband, the poor old dead Robert Baratheon - _as if the stag would ever match toe to toe with the lion,_ Ceresi smirks to herself - is making his warning call. " _Try and stop me if you can,"_ she thinks, as if the fat whoring ex-husband can somehow hear her. " _I am the storm, I am the one who brings the fire, the rain, the snow, the storm, I am Queen and you're nothing but a corpse._ "

"Your Grace," Qyburn bows humbly. "I hope I am not disturbing you."

"Not at all," Cersei keeps clenching onto the wine glass like a lifeline, she is unable to part from it despite it being an empty shell.

"We're ready, my queen. She awaits on the steps of the Sept of Baelor," he quips a smile at the mentioning of the old religious structure. Nothing remains there than rubble and ash and more rubble and ash, and the dead bodies that have fluttered away in the wind like seeds for a harvest. A constant reminder that the lion still has her claws, a constant reminder that the rains will weep over the halls for those who dare cross the Lannisters, and that Cersei heavily sends her regards.

Qyburn's words cause her to life her head up in defiance, eyes ablaze, chaotic emeralds aglow with the passion of wildfire. She knows of whom he speaks, and the hour of reckoning is there. "Very well," Cersei sets the wine glass down, nodding. "Let's get this over with."

The walk to the steps of Baelor are lonesome and solemn. Qyburn passes details of Jaime's capture at Moat Cailin, and Cersei ignores him. The man is no longer a part of her life. All that matters is the legacy, the ugly iron throne, and her child, anything else is collateral and will burn away like the rest. The Dragon Queen and the King in the North reached White Harbor earlier that morning, by estimates from ravens, and the snowfall has ceased for a brief time. She wonders if things go hand in hand, as if the Stark bastard returns to the North and the snow ceases to cover her. " _Even a dragon can freeze to death,_ " she gives a light smile at the joke.

Standing, still shackled, in front of the ashes of the Sept of Baelor, is Ellaria Sand, Oberyn Martell's paramour, mother of the Sand Snakes, and the leader of Dorne. Oh how the mighty do fall. Her gorgeous locks of onyx hair are splitting and long, like the claws of tree branches cracking into stone. Even through all the horrors she's suffered, a struggle reflects in the woman's eyes, a steely gaze that glares at Cersei as the Mad Queen approaches. A crowd is starting to form, keeping their distance from The Mountain's great sword, but curious enough to see what will happen with the traitor.

When Cersei comes to visit Ellaria earlier that morning, the woman that she met so long ago is a dead shell compared to what she sees now. Her daughter, though Cersei's never bothered enough to learn the girl's name - all fodder, truth be told - is a sagging pile of skin and bones, the poison leeching through the girl's body slow enough so a mother can watch her child die. Cersei ponders if Catelyn Stark watched her son die? A knife in the heart and a slit throat sounds good as any. Ellaria is dragged from her cage screaming, still screaming at the daughter's body as if her words are somehow going to resurrect the corpse back to life. No mother deserves to watch their child die, and Cersei has seen all of hers suffer and crumble. It is justice by the gods - _pah, the gods are bullshit_ \- that Ellaria Sand has all she knows ripped away from her before the reckoning hour is long before her.

Cersei stands on one of the remaining steps, facing the crowd of commoners clustered to witness the event. It has been a decision long in the works, and she'll write to Jaime one day when all of this madness is over that her brother indirectly helped Myrcella's killers be brought to their fitting end. His leaving hardens her heart, and she declares to the court that Ellaria Sand's execution is at hand and will happen on the morrow, until it is the very day.

"Citizens," Cersei begins, followed by a roar of thunder. She looks up at the sky, not with a glare, but a welcoming smile. Let nature weep and nature warn all of those who hear her message, the storm of House Lannister is on the rise after being on the fall for so, _so_ long. "Standing before you is Ellaria Sand, ruler of Dorne! She and her daughters were the killers of my daughter, _your_ princess, Myrcella. After counsel, we have decided that Ellaria Sand is accused of treason. And for that, she is to be sentenced to death," she crouches down next to the other woman, a woman she is supposed to be inspired by, a woman that is to be her equal in ways that Cersei cannot describe, yet all that will remain is a carcass that will become a feast for the crows. "Last words, Lady Sand?"

Ellaria turns her head, and the stare is haunting, but Cersei has stared into the eyes of those who are about to die, dying, or dead so many times that the haunting feel only lasts for a few seconds, like the tartness of a lemon, before fleeting away like the wind. "You are a monster."

Cersei gives a bemused smile, gripping Ellaria's face with her hands. "Look at me," she orders. The viper's eyes search everywhere else, still defying her own commands in the last seconds before death. "Look at me!" Cersei screams, bringing their faces closer together, where Ellaria's black pits are enraptured by the beauty of wildfire, of the coursing surge of bitter rage. "I must say, I thank your paramour for dying. The Red Viper helped create the very thing that shall be the end of you. He ended your love, and now he'll end you."

She stands back up, but not before Ellaria stutters out a harsh, "Whore!" as if her dying breaths are spent saying such a petty insult.

"Surely you can do better than that," she says dismally, and then louder, to the crowd, "I, Cersei, of the House Lannister, Protector of the Realm, and Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, sentence you to die!" her voice is thunder to the crowd, and a cheer rises up from that, and the chanting begins, and she is reminded of that day, at Baelor, with Ned Stark and her insane, _insane_ son that has remnants of wildfire burning in his gaze. She steps back. "Ser Gregor," she orders.

In the blink of an eye, The Mountain draws his great sword, and instead of beheading Ellaria in a guillotine fashion, the brute swipes his sword sideways so it takes the head clean off, severing the head from the rest of the body like cutting down the thickness of a tree. The crowd lifts in a roar, and cardinal spews everywhere. Ellaria's head is ripped from the ground, held in the Mountain's hand, out for all to see. The body slumps forward, headless, crimson blood pouring out into the cobblestones.

In the sky above, and at Cersei's behest, the grayness lets out a thunderous clap, and the rain begins to fall. It falls down so hard it mattes Cersei's hair to her head, where she can no longer see two feet in front of her face. The rainwater mixes with the blood and the soil, and Ellaria's body dampens underneath the bombardment. The Mountain chucks the head towards the crowd, which surges forward to seize it, the prize of the day, or perhaps even the food of the day should they be so bold.

Cersei lifts her head up to the sky, sighing with contentment, and the feeling of euphoria and the elixir of life rushes in her blood.

And so the rains weep o'er their halls, and not a voice for them to hear.

The rains of House Martell have fallen down, and fall down they'll continue until no more snakes and vipers and cobras litter Westeros.

Cersei turns her gaze north, and the rains call for House Targaryen.

* * *

 **There we are ladies and gents, that was Chapter #7: Rains of House Martell. In gist, due to Jaime's desertion, and Cersei's descent into madness, she's hastily executed Ellaria of House Martell. This has surpassed Chapter 3 as my favorite one in the story so far, and ironically enough they are both Lannister characters - 3 was in Jaime's perspective - as goodness aren't they amazing? Cersei is going to be one of my favorite POV's to write, if not my favorite, so let your thoughts abound for what's to come.**

 **The arc is almost over, nearing on Chapter 10. Do you think there will be any possible repercussions to Cersei's actions? I am also one of those who truly believes Cersei's pregnant, but what happens to the child entirely in terms of the show I think I already know. Did any of Cersei's tangent thoughts allude to other developments in her character or arc to come? If so, what are your thoughts?**

 **_Next Chapter P.O.V: A Lannister of Casterly Rock and The Salt Queen_**

 **Another chapter with two points of view, ladies and gents. Any takers as to who they are? I can't wait for the chapter, so I hope to see you all soon. Thank you so much for reading and I hope you have an amazing day! I love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	8. Chapter 8: Whisper and Sow

**Hello everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Phantoms of Ice and Fire, Chapter #8: Whisper and Sow. Our last chapter was from Ceresi's singular perspective of the death of Ellaria Sand and the 'rains' of House Martell to where now her gaze is set elsewhere. The two points of view (wow, another 2'er) we're looking at are Tyrion and Yara. Tyrion's point of view will be interesting** ** _and_** **I've never seen someone write in Yara's perspective besides myself, so this shall be interesting! The long waits between the chapters happen purely because I am trying to half the self-interest in writing said chapters... as my inspiration and desire comes and goes, on the onslaught of being busy. Enjoy Chapter #8: Whisper and Sow.**

* * *

 _ **Tyrion Lannister**_

"News?" Tyrion, the dwarf of Casterly Rock, a Lannister, and Hand of the Queen to Daenerys Targaryen, asks, noticing his companion's facial expression of withdrawn amusement.

Lord Varys the Spider clutches a parchment of paper, a rolled up raven scroll between his pasty fingers, a quip of a smile tugging at the top of his lips. "It'd be best if you read it, my lord." Varys hands Tyrion the message, taking a seat next to the dwarf. The party is stuck in White Harbor, languishing under carpeted halls and hearths for comfort. Snowfall is lightly falling down onto the ground outside, the cold chill returning. The sun is beginning to sink beneath the sky, the announcement of Greyjoy ships on the horizon sailing towards White Harbor.

Tyrion unfurls the scroll, the ink dark and blotted on the paper, fingers brushing over coarse material. The message is written in two sentences, curt and symbolic. _The canary sings no more. The North remembers. ~ Sansa Stark, Lady of Winterfell_

He looks up. He hasn't seen that name on paper in ages. He hasn't _heard_ her name in forever, a woman kissed by fire, shimmering diamond eyes. Her long neck. _Sansa Stark, Lady of Winterfell._ " _And Wardeness of the North,_ " Tyrion finishes in his mind, though not saying it aloud. He brings his attention back up to Varys. "The canary?" he frowns.

Varys shuffles his hands inside his robes, hands always hidden, hands always hiding. A spider constantly in waiting. "Lord Petyr Baelish, Warden of the East, Lord Protectorate of the Vale, and our Littlefinger," he holds for emphasis, "is dead."

The scroll falls from Tyrion's hand faster than anything he's ever dropped before. He's never liked the rat - though, a mockingbird is more primed for the man who's like a Littlefinger, scheming snob who is unable to keep himself away from scandals and secrets - but he's finding it hard, no impossible, to believe that someone has killed him.

"How?"

"A trial held by Lady Sansa, her sister, and their brother," Varys answers, picking up the scroll. "You'd be surprised at what he had been charged with, my lord."

"Hard to surprise me nowadays, you know that," Tyrion smirks. A moment of silence, where the coals crackle in the hearth, and the bell tolls chime. "Are you upset?"

The Spider opens his mouth, lips parting in an 'o', but an expression of feigned confusion is mirrored in pale eyes. "I once told Olenna Tyrell I rather enjoyed his company but that he'd rather be king of the ashes if he sat on the Iron Throne. Chaos is a ladder," he looks down at those words. "The expression he told me, the very last time I saw him in the throne room. And ever since that conversation, I've been keen on stopping him from ever being more than he would be."

"Since you-"

"Support the realm," Varys says softly, sadly, eyes downcast, miming melancholy. "Always to support the realm, yes."

Tyrion stands up from his seat, going over to the table that held the wine bottles and wine glasses. He picks one up, pouring himself a glass. He looks back at Varys, who is turning to stare out at the open window of the room. Tyrion fills him another glass, holding both and walking back to his usual seat. It is a stasis of downtime and quietness, for Daenerys and Jon are elsewhere being taken around by Lord Manderly. It leaves Tyrion to go and be elsewhere by his own machinations, for there's nothing more boring than a stroll. The Dothraki horde had reached the outer areas of White Harbor, where it would be time for Daenerys to decide where all her armies split.

Varys shoos the wine glass away. "No thank you, my lord," he refuses.

The dwarf's smile is all-telling. "A toast." He extends the glass once again, holding it out still. "To the late Littlefinger."

That brings another girlish grin back onto the Spider's face, and he reaches for the glass of wine. Both toss their cups back and drink in the sniveling rat's honor. Tyrion holds his glass down at his chest, letting the tartness and sourness bleed into his gums. It soaks pink, a mulling red, a dark and deepening dusk into the veins of his heart. Though he is not drinking as heavy as he used to back in King's Landing, or even over in Meereen, and never as heavily as Ceresi ever did - he shudders involuntarily at the thought of his corrupt sister - it is starting to where the turn of events is bringing him back to the beginning of dark, murky liquids.

His hand circles around the wine bottle, but something stops him from making the drink. It is unusual for Daenerys to not request his presence for supper, especially in the instance that the Dothraki and Northern forces were to depart in a few days time for Winterfell. There's always something to discuss, always something to act concerned about, always something... always something. It has to deal with Jon Snow, Tyrion deduces. He pours himself another drink. Somehow or other, it turns back to Ned Stark's bastard.

" _The bastard..._ " Tyrion tells himself, smirking into the wine glass at the double meaning of the name and insult. He thinks of the very first piece of advice he ever gives Jon Snow. A boy of eighteen with dark curls, a hard, set in stone expression of grim plastered on his face. The reflection of a sorrowing winter and cold, abandonment that thrives in the hearts of those who feel it. Gifted with a blade, not so much in the eloquences of human conversation. " _Never let it hurt you. Wear it like armor."_

 _"What do you know of being a bastard?"_ Jon's voice is harsh and cutting on the cold, Northern airs.

" _All dwarves are bastards in their father's eyes,"_ and Tyrion downs the next wine glass. What would his father think of him now? The mighty Tywin Lannister, settling down in a grave with a crossbow bolt to the heart, killed by the son he despises, and then the mighty loss of his family soon thereafter follows. The lion's claws are near not sharp enough after the mane has been shaved away from the rest of the body.

Another refill of his wine cup. Tyrion Lannister is feeling particularly thirsty this evening.

"Varys?" he asks, swirling his cup around.

"Yes, my lord?" Varys's voice is soft, always never brought up too loud.

Tyrion keeps his gaze fixated on the wall as he thinks. His mind is his weapon, like Jaime's sword requiring a whetstone. _Another expression told to Jon Snow, the honorable bastard of Winterfell, turned Lord Commander of the Night's Watch, and now the King in the North. Daenerys Targaryen's suitor, isn't he?_ "Were you ever jealous of Littlefinger?" he asks.

He looks back to see Varys's face. The Spider draws his eyebrows in, a nuance of conversation, a hint that he is thinking honestly at this point. A man who grows up an actor never learns when to take the mask off, Tyrion is told, and there's always something true to that statement, but it is the secret of finding where. "At times," the bald-headed man admits, finishing the rest of the wine in his cup. "Who wouldn't? Though I feel like the reaches of power are not as high within me like most men, we all do still crave it," Varys hands his glass to Tyrion. "Sometimes I can imagine what I'd do in his position, but never for more than a second," and then Varys asks something Tyrion did not expect. "Were you ever jealous of Littlefinger, my lord?"

Patience and understanding is all it takes for Tyrion to not expel the contents of his cup onto his friend's powdered face, with the way Varys asks the question. It is in the reverb of the words against the man's throat, almost mockingly, by the gleam in his eyes, and the way the hands position themselves in the Spider's lap, as if Tyrion is being made fun of by a man he's meant to care about. _Does Tyrion Lannister care about the insects that go and lie in the night?_

"How couldn't I be?" Tyrion offers that up as an answer, turning his back to Varys to face the decanter. "He was intelligent. He had money, never close to mine, but money, and he had the ability to make a name for himself outside the shadow of someone else," he exhales shakily. "He manages to find a way to worm his way into a great, ancient house. Becomes a _Warden,_ " the word is a gasp on Tyrion's lips, phantom-like in its release of the syllable 'ward' that has tones of venom underneath. "And even if he has to marry Lysa Arryn, that woman was crazy, and crazy with him. He had a woman, and I-"

"Had a whore..." Varys finishes the statement for him, quiet once more, and in a dying breath, the fire in the hearth dwindles down to barely an open flame.

Curls. Plaiting fingers down his ribcage. Heat. Tightness. Love, exhilaration and shaky breaths. Dark eyes drowning in lust, her name sharp and strong. Tyrion has not thought about her in a long time, a woman he expects he'll love and mourn for the rest of his life, but all for the wrong reasons. He's killed men, but it's a short list that he can count on his fingers, and she is there too, placed there, left there. A smudged memory on fingertips, prints that express an emotion of lost love and quietness. _Shae._ _My lioness._ _A lioness choked to death, a lion shot with a bolt to the heart, and the demonic dwarf to do both._

It is almost so sad that it is nearly pathetic. When Tyrion travels halfway across the world to Essos, he sees her, beautiful, radiant, moonlit hair with sharp eyes, a thunderous voice... and his eyes fall upon Daenerys Targaryen, the Mother of Dragons. It is silly, it is pathetic, that Tyrion's heart yearns for her. This paragon, this supreme ruler, this person who can turn Westeros around... and that he's collapsed to his knees for a goddess. Tyrion's love for Daenerys Targaryen is brief, short, and cut quickly when he realizes what path he's on.

Unfortunately, by then, it is too late, when the darkening, brooding Jon Snow arrives to Dragonstone. Gray clouds mark the bastard's arrival, and Tyrion is supposed to find this to be an omen, a warning sign, but then there's an evening on the ship, a boat, a rocking of said boat, and Tyrion's mirror shatters to pieces.

Varys leaves him when a loud Northman voice rings out over the castle. "Ships approaching!"

Tyrion's goodbye is left lingering on his lips, and he cannot bring himself to take one last sip of wine from his glass. A single, solidary tear falls from his eyes down his cheeks, crystalline in color, world-shattering in power, where it splashes onto the floor. He grips the wine glass, and it shatters in his hands, shards scarring flesh, spilling cardinal to the floor, and he hears the whispers rise on the wind.

How can one of the smartest men in Westeros make such a dumb decision in falling in love?

* * *

 ** _Yara Greyjoy_**

Freedom is an interesting expression. Though Yara will not call herself any sort of philosophic thinker - she's anything other than - there's a part of her that searches for a piece of understanding about the good life. The smells of the sea are strong, as she takes deep breaths, exhaling out the airs and joys of the open seas. Theon stands behind her, less timid, she is noticing, and it does wonders for her.

The high rise beauty of White Harbor cannot be overstated, and Yara admits that it is a beautiful place, compared to the stinking gray of the Iron Islands. She rests her elbows on the railings on the side of the boat, smelling the sweet breeze, and seeing the fluffy white clouds on the horizon. It is almost picturesque, but now there's a vendetta clouding over it all, in the back of Yara's mind. To fight dead people, having heard it from Theon himself, to fight Cersei, to fight their uncle... all of that is a petty matter to what may very well be bringing those gray winds further in the North.

Yara's hair blows back somewhat in the breeze. She decides to keep it long, to keep it down, perhaps a symbol of what she had to deal with while under her uncle's care, or lack thereof. The vice of the iron chain still holds her throat still, a bruise lacerating around a pale throat, blotted spots of black and blue that rise when pressed on. Her voice cracks ever so slightly at times, ones that cause Theon to worry, but she is over the hating phase of her brother after watching him jump off the ship many weeks ago.

" _When all of this felt like a dream..._ " Yara thinks to herself, bitterly.

Now it is a reality with pain and anger and more pain and more anger. However, this is not the time to dwell on that ideal any longer.

Theon joins his sister out at the front of the bow, as the ship begins to mark its landing in White Harbor, the sigil of House Greyjoy rising high above the waters. A return is on the rise, though Westeros cannot see it; this pact with the Dragon Queen and now the newfound King in the North that'll let the forgotten and beset Iron Islands back into the fold, and where they can call themselves somewhat more autonomous than the rest.

"You never expected you'd be back here, again, would you?" she asks her brother after the ship finally pulls into the harbor. A portcullis greets their first look upon White Harbor at a closer glance. Although Yara is not directly mentioning White Harbor, since that had never been Theon's initial choice of destination, it'll be the first time in a year since he's seen the grayness in the skies of the North, where the hatreds still run deep, but Yara has sworn to every ounce of water that flourishes in the sea that she'll murder any Northman who believes Theon Greyjoy has not atoned for his sins.

"No," Theon admits, biting his lower lip, and looking down at the ground. No longer is the look hesitant, or hurt like a wounded dog, but something stronger, a constant looking down that fills him with strength, rage, and empowerment. "But here we are..."

Yara knows of what Theon did to get to her; a near-to-death beating by some fatheaded sailor who thinks that amnesty is a reason to abandon members of your own family. The message still rings clear over the years, _don't die too far from the sea._ Yara finds it ironic that a bit of her died, somewhere, out on the open water, enclosed in the Narrow Sea against Euron's silenced soldiers of the storm. Theon regains his vitality at the sea, washing his face in the waves, and she's immediately taken by a joy in her heart that she'll never be able to replicate into words about how much it means to her. The fettered iron chain that Ramsay Bolton holds over her brother is no more.

The group meeting the Greyjoy siblings is formidable in its own-self, in its own right. Yara recognizes Daenerys handedly, with her locks of silver hair, and her eccentric gaze. It is a pity, the female Greyjoy sibling laments to herself, that there's never been any future developments with that avenue. A taste of a dragon must be life-threatening. Next to her, on Daenerys' left, is the Imp, which has gotten cleanlier, but Yara holds some distaste for his sharpness against her brother from years ago. Then, on the Dragon Queen's right, someone that lifts Yara's eyebrows up in questioning.

 _Who is this?_

It must be the self-proclaimed Jon Snow, the brooding man that Theon tells Yara about over cups of ale, of how this is the man who tells him he does not need to choose between Greyjoy and Stark. That he's not dead for having saved the kissed by fire sister, and that he's quite heavy on the eyes. Yara gives him a one-quick over, gives their usual greetings and formalities, titles that Yara has hardly gotten used to saying, and the group convenes in one of the dining halls inside White Harbor.

It is the Spider, Lord Varys, if Yara recalls, that is the first to speak when all is said and done. "It is the most welcoming news to see you are here unharmed, Lady Yara," and the sickening smell of perfume and lies and fancifulness wafts up Yara's nose, making the compliment sound more barbed than smooth.

Daenerys furrows her brow together, frowning. "And of Ellaria?"

Yara had nearly forgotten about the matriarch of the Sand Snakes, with her venom laced tongue, those elegant dark curls, her lithe figure, and those hips that could bring a brute to his knees. A shudder racks through her body; it is that moment of letting her guard down, that moment of curling herself inwards to desire does all of this. It breaks her gaze away from the table. "Last I could remember, she's still a prisoner of Cersei Lannister."

Tyrion purses his lips, tapping his stubby fingers on the table. "About that..." and it causes the table - a motley crew of Yara, Theon, Daenerys, Tyrion, Varys, the bastard Jon Snow, Jorah Mormont, the Hound, and Brienne of Tarth - to all look over. The Lord Hand continues to tap on the rivets of the wooden board. "Cersei sent ravens everywhere proclaiming her execution. The ' _Ruin of House Martell_ ' she called it, even though Ellaria Sand had never been a part of House Martell and it just proves my sister's-"

"It is unfortunate," Daenerys cuts in, which leaves Tyrion stuck in mid-sentence, perhaps some jape about his sister, but he silences himself on her command. Yara flashes a glance between both Lord Tyrion and Daenerys, as if there's an imminent power struggle passing between the two, but the silverette continues speaking as planned. "What has happened to my allies, and we are grateful that you have returned. We must all capitalize our losses," then with a turn of the head at her right, she says, "Ser Jorah."

The knight that is Ser Jorah Mormont of Bear Island stands up, going over to a table on the left of them, where a map of Westeros had been located. Yara takes in the man's appearance for a bit, enraptured by the steely gaze in his eyes, a face hardened by cold gales and snowfalls, but a softness regarded for someone in his movements, though she is unable to tell for whom this encompasses. The occupants of the table scoot back some to allow room for the map to be placed, the edges spilling over the wood, parchment coarse and rough to the touch as Yara runs her fingers over it.

Tyrion stands, as it seems to be his position in always mapping out the plans of the congregated forces. "As you can all tell, this is Westeros," for some reason there is no sharp response back to the sarcastic comment. "We are here, in White Harbor," as he speaks, he points to the location. "Meeting up at Winterfell to then take the fight up North against the Army of the Dead," waddling around to the head of the table. "Cersei's forces have not been spotted to be on the move, which is alarming..." he pauses, craning his neck, as if he has more to say, and she can tell he is thinking of more to say, a sentence he'll never bring out to the light. "But we must forge ahead instead. After heavy consideration, the Dothraki will continue with us to Winterfell, and the Unsullied are to remain here in White Harbor. Now, with the addition of the Greyjoy fleet again, it strengthens our position to have them remain here as well."

That causes Yara to snap her head up at the Imp, having been perusing over the battle plans marked over the cartography like a child stabbing at it with a blade. "What? Have the Ironborn remain here? _Away_ from a battle?"

"It is ill seeming at first-" Daenerys begins, facial expression troubled as if she is trying to deter the situation from breaking again.

It is the first time Yara hears Jon Snow, the bastard, speak. She notes his presence immediately, a dark sliver of shadow that plummets the mood in the room. "Lady Yara, have you ever heard of the phrase, 'The North Remembers'?" She nods, complacently, having heard it from Theon's mouth. "It is not just a phrase describing the murder of the Stark forces at the Twins. It is also for your invasion of our lands." The ice in his voice does not go unnoticed.

She lifts her chin up, gaze wrought with iron. "You'd think that they'd be-"

"Northmen are _not_ forgiving," Jon cuts in. "They never have been. Most of the Northern lords do not know that I swore fealty to Queen Daenerys just recently. It'll be difficult getting most, if not all of them, to see her as a ruler or a helper even though the dead are coming. It is our nature," and the expression that passes over Jon's face almost near resembled sadness, but Yara can see it, the bitterness in his throat, the venom he's holding back. "All of the Northern lords, despite tumultuous feelings over House Bolton, were still Northerners, and Theon was not. They'd all be calling for his head. It would be futile having myself intervene."

"You'd rather have us act like cowards at the edge of the sea?" Yara's voice rises to a level of incredulousness.

It is Daenerys' turn to intervene. "We are still expecting your uncle to pull something fast-handed on us," she turns her gaze to Theon. "You say he wasn't at Pyke when you returned for her?"

"Gone," Theon says, but it is a straining croak that pushes at the boundaries at his throat. "He hadn't been there and no one told me where he had gone. Before they had passed out or died due to blood loss, I mean."

Yara locks her jaw, a hand resting on the edge of the table. It could all go south once more, and she could take the small force of Iron Islanders she has with her the other way and return to King's Landing... mayhaps not King's Landing, but elsewhere, anywhere not in the North. However, she swears an oath, and an oath she'll try to keep, if there's nothing else in this world she cannot hold to herself any longer.

"Fine," she declares, standing abruptly. "The Ironborn will remain here at White Harbor."

Daenerys lifts her head, eyes bright in pride, and a fosterence builds around the table. It is just as it had been before, back in Meereen, only this time, Yara meant her promise.

However, even a Kraken is not invincible to the freeze.

Yara is to be wise to remember then, in the wars to come.

If the words of House Greyjoy were, ' _we do not sow_ ', they ought to be changed to, ' _we do not survive the cold winters._ '

* * *

 **There we are ladies and gentlemen! That was Chapter #8: Whisper and Sow, of Phantoms of Ice and Fire. I like writing Tyrion's point of view, which does not appear as common seven other characters in the piece, but that may be because I am starting to like him less and less as I continue re-watching the episodes and series, although just like with Jon and Dany, I had never actually been enamored by him either - Jaime, Sansa, Theon, Catelyn, and Margarey were the five I truly focused on and loved more than the others - but writing his perspective is challenging and fun.**

 **Yara has returned to the Game of Thrones, and I like writing her solidness, because like Theon, she's been ravaged and changed, and I feel that if she returns to the show, since that has been tossed in the air, I imagine her character will be akin to that of a wildcard because her entire demeanor could've broken by how Euron may have treated her, especially if she's dead by the time Theon goes to rescue her. Next chapter we're returning to a singular POV, a slightly shorter chapter - probably around 3-3.5k - and then the ending of Arc I which has been setting all the game board pieces.**

 _ **Next Chapter P.O.V: The Lighting Lord**_

 **Any recalls to who is given that name? If you do, good on you! I hope you all review, and thank you so much for reading! I hope you have an amazing day! I love you all so much! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


	9. Chapter 9: Winter's First Kiss

**Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a brand new chapter of Phantoms of Ice and Fire, Chapter #9: Winter's First Kiss. I know I haven't updated this story in a little over a year and a few months, but after realizing that I had a terrible plotline I needed to rewrite it... and surprisingly, a few of my plot points match with what Season 8 has started to show - I personally will tell my opinions about it at the end eventually - and that has actually been why I haven't posted in so long... I had to re-haul the entire story, because my plot was rather shoddy.**

 **Beyond that, I am back and the latest episode - it felt like a dream to me, watching it especially with those Daenerys scenes - spurred to me start writing this at 3 AM because why not? Here we are, with the Lightning Lord, Beric Dondarrion, for Chapter #9: Winter's First Kiss. Enjoy the chapter!**

* * *

 ** _Beric Dondarrion_**

The winter winds have left much to be desired. The chilling temperatures that sink beneath his skin and freeze his bones, limbs trying to move through drifts of snow... the gales that send the furs flying through the sky, and in the shadows, riding the evermoving clouds above, the snarls and blue-eyed stares of ice devils and ice-breathing dragons. The flames on Beric's sword illuminate only his brief section of space, and when he passes his weapon from hand to hand, another member of their group is briefly surrounded by an amber glow.

The hues match Tormund's ginger hair - kissed by fire in an ironic sense, now, Beric mulls in his head - which are contrasted by the starkness of the stone walls alongside them. Upwards a bit do the flames illuminate a sea of black, a fur coat that trails long down to the floor, helmed by a dour captain with a grimacing face that peeks around corners. Lord Commander Eddison Tollett of the Night's Watch, the 999th man to don the cape after Jon Snow so ungracefully plops it into his arms before disappearing from The Wall. Beric does not believe any remainder of the Night's Watch to even be alive after the Night King swoops by and the Wall falls underneath a torrent of ice, fire, sleet, magic, and demon tricks.

The walk to Castle Black is a minimum few days journey atop the ridge that used to separate the grumkins and snarks from the rest of Westeros, from Essos, from all the lords and ladies and peasants and downtrodden that only believed the Night King and the army of the dead to be a simple myth, what wet nurses tell their charges to keep them in line... only for one who may have been a skeptic back in his King's Landing days to stare them straight in the face and live to tell the tale. Beric can only imagine, had Thoros, or Sandor Clegane told him then what would lie beyond in the North, a faint and distant realm, he would have laughed directly in their faces. Who is laughing now?

Tormund hugs Edd as tight as he can when the two meet, Beric giving a polite nod in the corner. With the stragglers from Eastwatch and the rough-around-the-edges forty or so men that were left at Castle Black, the collective strength of the Night's Watch, a good fifty-five strong, depart. There is nowhere else to go but South, to be behind the army of the dead as they march. Taking the main map from the library which depicts all of Westeros, tightly kept under Edd's arm, the hearty band departs under cold tidings, and the whispers of the dead that float on the wind.

Only a week later - may truly be only three or four days, as Beric is no longer trying to really keep count of how long - does the first real sign of civilization come into view. Over a hill, towers rise through the blizzards, a castle in the middle of nothing, sparse trees and the occasional rocky path surrounding it. The group have come across a few slovenly built homes earlier, coming down from Castle Black, but shivers race up Beric's arms when they reach The Gift, and it has all been abandoned.

"Abandoned or part of the Night King's army..." Tormund mutters into his horn of ale one night when they make camp, the tears on his cheeks having long since been dried. He's cried enough for his people, he's cried enough about the end of the North, and it is time for action. Beric believes Tormund must have a part to play in the war against the Night King; he's survived way too many times for there to not be a sign of destiny intertwining somehow, somewhere along the road.

Beric's understanding of most of the Northern geography has been muddled as of late in his later years - his maester would most certainly crack his knuckles with a ruler had he heard this - but it is impossible to forget that the closest fortification is the Last Hearth, held by the Northern vassal of House Umber. Silence greets them, the last roaring fires of any hearths smoldered out long ago, and all that is left is the chilling wind. He has always had a hand on his sword, but the moment the castle comes into view, a spear of ice plunges itself into his heart.

There haven't been any signs of life on their way down yet. Any semblance of structure has been abandoned, and there are no bones or corpses in their place to signify that death had rolled through the area. Beric cannot remember the last time he saw the sun in the sky, where there were zero clouds, zero white on the ground, and now he's being forced through all of this. R'hllor has been unclear, and Beric is unable to see through the flames like Thoros can, but he knows there has to be a reason for him to have been resurrected so many times, to now only end up on his last life without his priest, still not really knowing the exact reason as to why he's even alive.

He may not ever get the chance.

A few days without any signs of the dead has started to weigh heavily on his mind. Surely they either have caught up to them, or perhaps the dead have moved so fast that all of Westeros ahead of them has been wiped out. Beric knows he's never been the happiest or most positive companion in the world to be with, but even that thought weighs him down more than simply trudging through the snow.

Last Hearth is eerily quiet... too quiet almost, as if the castle had indeed created its last hearth days ago, perhaps hours ago, weeks ago... Beric isn't sure. Tormund and Edd are by his side, as he goes first, stepping through the archway that would've been a gate. He assumes it to be a gate, but the hinges are blown off, scattered bits of wood tossed into the courtyard. Only something with an extreme amount of force would have done that, no human or battering ram is strong enough for that. He looks back at Tormund, lifting his head, clenching stronger to the hilt of his sword.

There is zero sound. No chirping birds. No noise uttered by any possible animal, such as a squirrel or even a rat... just the crunching of the snow under their footsteps, which sound like peals of thunder inside the Lighting Lord's ears. The courtyard is a mess of bodies, an absolute array of chaos. Beric swallows heavily, one hand clenching his blade through his glove.

" _Lord of Light protect us..."_ he thinks to himself, as his hand then rips up the blade. Scarlet flames erupt, singing a siren song from the steel, a hiss accompanying it to the wind. Edd takes a step back, cursing under his breath, but Tormund is unmoving in his tension. He is holding onto a dragonglass axe, the obsidian blade reflecting off of the flames.

Stepping forward slightly, Beric scans the courtyard. Tables are overturned, the legs covered in a blanket of ice, sleet, and the unmistakable sheen of blood. The smell of rust is ripe on the air, which means fresh kills. A few corpses are strung over a table, hands lifelessly drifting in the snow banks, hair billowing in the wind, limbs torn in various places, joints bent at awkward angles. A sea of crimson in a blizzard of silver, and his flames are unable to save them. The Lord of Light did not protect these people at Last Hearth.

Beric bows his head with every fresh corpse he walks by, the remaining wildlings and Night's Watch men following in line behind him, careful to not breach too far from the group. The Lightning Lord half expects a hand to reach out from the drift and grab him, but his blade will protect him. R'hllor will protect him.

" _The same way he protected you the other times you've been killed, Beric?"_ a voice whispers. It might be his, it might not be, he isn't sure. " _The same fire god that let your Thoros die in the Northern wilderness... did he protect him? Did he protect the fire made flesh that saved you from death? Has he saved these poor people here in the Last Hearth? The Lord of Light... R'hllor does not protect. He only decimates."_

He tries to keep those thoughts at bay, but they've been coming in more and more frequently since losing Thoros on the frozen lake. The days after Daenerys and Jon leave to go to King's Landing, which is a three week sailing trip, it is just Beric and Tormund back at Eastwatch. It is his days walking on top of the wall, listening to the scout reports, observing and making sure that the tree line is safe from the army of the dead that cause these thoughts to become more than that. Bitter seeds of regret can be planted in even the smallest of ways, as he is finding out. He's lost his friend, his best friend if he can even go as far to think that, who has brought him back when no one else would have thought to do so, someone that breathed life back into his veins. Gone. Gone against an enemy that seems to be unbeatable.

Beric forces a smile to himself while trudging through the snow. He can act like this all he wants when he's facing down the Night King. Not before. Certainly not before.

A hallway in front of them is pitch black, the freezing winds having blown out the torches that lined the hall. Beric freezes a few more steps underneath the archway, the rest behind him ceasing their walk as well. What is that sound? Beric holds up his fist, so no one else would walk ahead of him. Tormund matches him step for step, brushing shoulders with his furs that decorate his back. Ahead, down the hallway, Beric can hear the light crackling of ice in the darkness. All the hair on his arms stand on end, and a light blue mist rolls from the shroud of black.

His ears begin to ring, and flashing, out of the shadows, something blurs by the group, missing he and Tormund by a hair of an inch. _A spear._ Edd barely lets out a warning cry before it catches one of the wildlings in the chest, it sending him back and further into the snow. When his body smashes into a snow drift, blood begins to spurt out of the wound. A White Walker spear is stuck out of the man's flesh, his hands encircled around the projectile, before they fall limp to his side.

Beric begins to back up, warily. The sound of his breathing rises higher and higher at a fever pitch. Out of the darkness, as a chill rips through his body, a pair of blue eyes becomes visible. The temperature drops further, where it hurts to have his chest rise and fall as high as he is allowing it. The flames that lick his sword barely cling on, as if R'hllor himself is hanging on by a thread. The crackling of ice gets louder, as a White Walker appears out of the black, his armor stained with blood. One of the curved icicle swords is clenched in the devil's hand, a wispy white beard poking out from underneath his chin.

His eyes appraise over the collected group of survivors, and then his eyes match with Beric's, another chill lancing the Lightning Lord in the heart. No mere mortal would have a blade that can catch fire, that is a supernatural occurrence. Beric brandishes the weapon in his hands, letting out a growl. His weapon will be unable to do anything to the White Walker. It'll simply shatter should the ice demon manage to hit his own blade with the shard of frozen wrath.

Edd lets out a gasp, hard to hear, but Beric hears it. Looking to his right, a corpse that had been pinned up against the wall via a cart that stabbed them in the chest and throat began to shake. Within seconds, their eyes snapped open, as blue as the water in the cleanest sea. All around the group of survivors, the corpses of the Last Hearth get to their feet. A wave of death, a wave of blue. A group of innocent people, who must've have been just recently slaughtered by the army of the dead, to only be risen again by this White Walker general - he does not look like the Night King, as Beric specifically remembers the horned crown atop the creature's skull - and fight like an animal, a monster devoid of a human soul.

The White Walker lifts a hand to grab the hilt of its sword, removing it from its scabbard. It lets out an inhumane hiss, and the wights charged.

Beric unleashes a scream, swinging his sword out in a wide arc. The wight that he saw raise back from the dead reaches him the quickest, immediately to fall desolate again to the flames of R'hollor, the amber fire disintegrating the demon's flesh. Edd yelps in fright, ducking underneath a wight that is holding onto a simple knife - a woman with brown hair down to midback, holding something that would cut food - and he dives his sword into the wight's back.

Tormund does not hesitate, holding out his axe, running straight for the White Walker. It lifts its head, eyes narrowing, beckoning forth a challenge. The challenge never comes. Holding his axe, the wildling leader throws it by the end piece with all of his might at the demon's head. The White Walker slices downwards with its sword, trying to slash at Tormund, who is defenseless, but he backs up in time. The dragonglass axe head buries itself directly into the general's skull, between the ghastly blue eyes.

Everything freezes for a moment, and then the White Walker shatters into a million pieces of ice, crystal, and diamond. Beric is about to slice a wight open from neck to gut, but it collapses down again onto the snow, a clawed hand falling into the drift inches away from him. He looks back at Tormund, trying to break into a smile, but something stills his face. The wildling steps forward, keeping his eyes up and alert in case anything else is supposed to happen that shouldn't. Tormund grabs the axe and leaves it by his side.

Save for the dead man from the icicle spear throw, the others hadn't been in combat long enough for any damage to be done. Edd wipes his mouth with the back of his gloved hand. Beric closes his hand around the tip of his sword, sliding his hand down back to the hilt, the flames extinguishing as his fingers trace the steel.

"A sentry..." he mumbles, lowering his sword.

"Not any longer," Tormund says, his tone rising a bit into happiness, but not enough to be considered joyous. _The Lord of Light has saved you once again, Beric Dondarrion. Yet these poor people came back, briefly, to fight for the Army of the Dead._ "Left behind to catch any stragglers."

"Perhaps," Edd mutters, sheathing his sword. "You didn't give him a chance to explain. We didn't ask."

Beric pats the wildling on the shoulder. "You didn't even hesitate."

Tormund's eyes are an aquatic sea of misery - Beric knows that even if his companion became a wight, their sort of blue is one even sharper than that of someone who has the brightest eyes, he'll know. Sometimes, just sometimes, if caught in the lower end of a horn of ale, it looks as if Tormund is changing between his very eyes to a wight - that show no signs of happiness. "They've destroyed my people. I will destroy them every chance I get."

"That is why we fight. Why the Lord of Light has me here," Beric nods, agreeing. His tongue tastes sour, as if he is saying words of acid, but he tries to keep the smile on his face.

"If he can resurrect you," Edd grumbles, "Why can't he send us some bloody light?"

"I-" Beric opens his mouth, to rebuttal that it is impossible to know what the Lord of Light wants, to speak to a god that has made their presence known without ever being seen. One does not just wish for a god to perform a miracle and said miracle will come true. He does not get the chance to enlighten Dolorous Edd.

On the air, loud and crisp as the crackling sounds of ice, a dragon roar can be heard. Everyone flinches, looking wildly in the sky.

The Night King is close. Viserion is close.

The North has experienced the first steps of the army of the dead.

They've experienced winter's first kiss.

* * *

 **Alrighty! That was Chapter #9: Winter's First Kiss, from Beric's point of view, our Lightning Lord. I know that is mostly a copy of the scene from Season 8, Episode 1 - a bit of this story has merged, where the generality of the plot has ended up the same, but the battle of Winterfell and beyond is vastly different - but with tweaks thrown in. A White Walker is down, and who knows... a sizeable chunk of the army of the dead might be gone as well. Beric's inner monologue is also something not fully discussed in the show, let alone the books, and that is what I am really enjoying with this story, with the experience it gives me.**

 **Next chapter is going to be rather long, more likely more than 5k, and maybe even on the border of 10k, as me updating this plotline, changing the storyline, it was originally going to be one or two POV's a chapter, a single scene, but instead of dragging it like such, having a word count maximum I wish to reach shall make this actually easier. The pieces are being set in motion, as the first arc is nearly complete.**

 _ **Next Chapter P.O.V's: A Little Bird and the King and the North and a Cripple**_

 **I imagine it might be easy to assume whose perspectives we are looking from next chapter, and I am excited for it. I am so happy to be back writing this story, to get onto the end of the TV show - can't believe it is over on May 19th... that is hard to fathom, actually - and for this fanfiction; I hope you are too. Please review, it'll mean a lot to me, and I will more than welcome commentary with you all back and forth via PM's for the story as well. Have an amazing day! Love you all! Bye!**

 **~ Paradigm**


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